The Endless Golden Dunes

Chapter 29: An Old Friend

SALMAN

  
Buraq was far kinder now. Whenever he felt that Salman was about to fall, he made sure to stop and let him rebalance. The boy, sixteen for two months, thought that he was improving in the art of horse riding.
  
‘You are good at this.’ He told himself, though it sounded as if he was talking to Buraq.

*** 
  

He went on to ride for a few more moments until he was stopped by a stray captain.
  
‘Horse riding training is over,’ he said. ‘You should be moving on to swordplay.’
  
‘Can I not spend a bit more time doing this?’
  
‘You cannot. That is an order, Salman.’
  
Salman sighed.
  
‘Just ten more minutes, please?’
  
The captain thought about it and let out a sigh himself.
  
‘Well, it doesn’t seem you would be willing to go, so I think I will allow a few more minutes. I mean, you might as well become as good on horseback as the Mongols themselves.’
  
Salman thanked the captain profusely as he galloped away. Salman smiled to himself and striked the mane of Buraq.
  
‘Hear that? We get to stay a bit longer. Are you happy with that?’
  
He snorted.
  
‘I will interpret that as a yes.’
  
But as Salman lifted his head to look forward, his smile faded away. In the distance, he saw another man on horseback. He wasn’t a soldier as he wasn’t wearing armor, but rather a white kameez. Salman recoiled and knitted his eyebrows. He thought that the sight was strange. They were in a cold valley and all this man had to wear was a kameez?
  
Salman was frozen for some time while the man trotted forward. He was close enough for Salman to smell him. He smelled of the desert. Salman’s mind conjured up the image of the shifting dunes, and he closed his eyes involuntarily, trying to feel the scent of the sand.
  
When Salman opened his eyes, he was surprised to see that the man was right in front of him, though that wasn’t the thing that surprised him. What surprised him was the fact that he recognized the man. It had been so long.
  
‘Assalamualaikum, Salman.’ The man greeted with a smile that didn’t look worldly.
  
‘Akbar, is this you?’ Salman asked, aghast.
  
‘Ah, I did not know you would notice. It has been what? Nearly five months? Quite the miracle that you remember me.’
  
‘You were in Baghdad! Why are you here all of a sudden?’ Salman nearly yelled.
  
‘So a scholar is not allowed to travel suddenly? Who is making these rules, sadiq?’
  
‘It’s just that, I did not expect this from you. I am in a valley in Persia, and you are here?’
  
Salman couldn’t really convert his perplexion into words at the moment. Perhaps he was even too stunned to speak sensible sentences for too long. Most of the time, he opened and closed his mouth inaudibly.
  
Akbar, meanwhile, continued to smile.
  
‘The world always works in strange ways, Salman. I am simply part of the peculiarity.’
  
Akbar looked at the boy up and down and frowned. He shook his head.
  
‘Has the story I told have no effect on you?’ he asked.
  
‘What do you mean?’
  
‘Ah, do you need reminding on the tale of Babar? How he led himself to death in search to please his father? You are being foolish, Salman.’
  
His voice had lost its flowerness, and it was replaced by a scolding tone.
  
‘I am not being foolish. This is a journey of mine, and I will achieve my goal.’ Salman said with determination.
  
Akbar shook his head.
  
‘In search for what is valueful, you lose something that has no price: your life.’
  
‘You are not speaking the truth, Akbar. If I have come to prove myself, then even death will not stop me.’
  
‘That is ignorant. You lead yourself to drown in the sea of what seems to be opportunities. You ride to doom just as Babar did. I warn you, Salman, you fight this war for another mortal. You fight this war for the approval of your father. That never ends well. You will die just as Babar did if you continue fighting for your abu.’
  
‘What madness brought you to speak such things? Allah knows more than you, and He will be more than willing to help me.’
  
At that point, Salman did not care how Akbar knew all about him. He was simply angry at his opinion.
  
‘Do you expect that He will help you when your intention is this? Salman, you must change your intention. Do you think you are worthy to be the heir of your father?’
  
‘I am not! I admit that. Why do you think that I am here? I am here to prove myself.’
  
Akbar sighed.
  
‘Salman,’ he began, his voice gentle this time. ‘In war, there is no proving. These stories that you hear of glory? They are nothing but tales. War is the worst thing man has created. There are no winners in it. There are only those who suffer and those who die. There is a mighty chance that you will die. That is why I am saying that you shouldn’t die searching for something as simple as the approval of your father. Die for two beings only: Allah, and yourself. If you were to die for yourself, then you will die with peace. You would have been searching for something you wanted instead of what others did. I see that there is an honor in dying while doing something for yourself.’
  
‘That is selfish! I will die for my father happily. He has raised me for my entire life while my mother ran away.’
  
‘And who told you that story?’
  
‘Are you suggesting my father lied?’
  
‘There is a possibility.’
  
‘I considered you wise, Akbar, Now I realize you are nothing but an idiot.’
  
‘What you do or do not think of me does not matter. In the days when you forget me, remember my words. They will take you far. Die for yourself, and only yourself. Prove yourself to yourself only, for it is only your soul that can truly say if you are good enough or not. Yasir has appeared.’
  
By pure instinct, Salman turned and saw three messenger soldiers, Yasir included. When he turned back to Akbar, the scholar was gone. Salman craned his neck and looked everywhere his eyes could reach, but didn’t manage to see where he was.
  
He wanted to gallop to see where Akbar was, but was stopped by a captain.
  
‘Didn’t do anything in the extra time I gave you?’ he asked. ‘A time waster. Come! Letters have appeared.’
  
And as Salman followed him, he didn’t stop wondering where Akbar was, and his words.
  
‘Die for yourself, and only yourself. Prove yourself to yourself only, for it is only your soul that can truly say if you are good enough or not.’
  
Salman brushed them away, or at least tried to. The thought lingered on like invisible jinns.

AKBAR

  
How many fools must die because of needless achievements? That was Akbar’s question.
  
He was on top of a hill, away from sight, and saw Salman talking to Yasir and he couldn’t help but think of what the future was for him. He had seen many people and had asked himself the same question whenever he met them: what does fate hold for him? He wondered the same thing when he saw Yusaf’s brothers throw him into a well. He had thought of something similar when he saw Ibrahim go to the mountains to ponder about God.
  
‘I wonder why we take interest in human affairs,’ he said aloud. ‘Lord, did you make all of us similar, or is it just me who is the only one curious about such matters?’
  
In reply, there was silence except the light wind.
  
‘Ah, of course, You must not reveal too much of the secrets that You hold. After all, even the angels, those closest to you, have not seen a fraction of Your knowledge.’
  
He reminded himself that he was just another servant of God. Though he was a jinn, and so not human, he was still a mortal and could die. He was not some sort of immortal being who could do whatever he wanted, and just had to will it. If that was the case, he would have simply willed Salman to go back to Baghdad. In fact, he might have not cared about Salman at all.
  
Akbar wondered what happened to one after death. Well, it was obvious. First, Izraeel would take the soul out of one’s body, and then the body will be in barzakh, waiting for the Day of Judgement. After that, one would go to either Heaven or Hell.
  
He shivered at the thought that his soul would be taken away from him. But he was now old and wise, so he had accepted the fact that he would die long before he had even looked at Isa, the one who resurrected the dead. He smiled at the reminder that he will die soon.
  
‘I think that is fair. I die, humans die, angels die. We all go to You. We are equal.’
  
When his gaze returned to the person he worried about, he frowned again, reminded of what was to be.
  
‘You foolish half child,’ he muttered, shaking his head. ‘I cannot foretell the future, but I can say that it does not hold good things for you. But poison can be sweetened, so perhaps you can add honey - meaning – to your demise. Please, Salman, take my words to heart. Remember them. Do not remember me, remember them.’
  
He saw the last of Salman and prayed, prayed to God that only the best outcome happen to Salman.
  
‘Protect him, Lord, protect him.’

SALMAN
  
  

‘I fret to know what he has written back.’ Yasir said.
  
‘Cannot be too bad, right? I mean, I doubt he actually gave an answer.’ Salman said, a bit disappointed that that was his most accurate prediction.
  
‘Nonetheless, it was a daring, yet foolish move by you.’ Yasir looked at him with a disapproving gaze.
  
‘You suggested the idea.’
  
‘We have had this argument before. I do not wish to repeat obnoxious things.’
  
‘Anyway, what do you think he has written; my father?’
  
‘I cannot be too sure, honestly. I can guess that he has told you to be quiet about such matters.’
  
Salman thought that it was a fair answer. If he was Abdullah, he might have done the same thing.
  
Then he remembered something.
  
‘Wait, do you know what happened to Huraira?’ he asked.
  
Yasir was the one who had told him to write about Huraira. Surely he knew? He wouldn’t suggest such a thing if he himself was unaware of what had happened to his grandfather.
  
To Salman’s dismay, Yasir shook his head, though not as an answer to his question.
  
‘I cannot tell you of secrets that were entrusted upon me,’ he stated. ‘What happened to Huraira is a matter few know, and it is Abdullah’s job that he tells you, not mine.’
  
Salman sighed, but he nodded.
  
‘Thank you for bringing this message.’ He thanked.
  
‘My pleasure to do so.’
  
He looked at him for a moment, contemplating if he should talk just a little bit more with him. In truth, he was afraid of what Abdullah had answered. He wanted to delay the reveal as much as possible. Should he perhaps return the letter? But Yasir would never agree to do it, though.
  
His fingers curved, making the letter he was holding crumble a little. He had already imagined what kind of strokes his father had used, the scolding, and maybe even curses. He knew all too well how he acted whenever the topic of Fatima came.
  
‘Wherever she strolled, men watched her, drooled, begged her to marry them. But what would she do? She would just give them fake promises and go on to take advantage from another man.’
  
The words were clear, the villain that was Fatima was painted right there. Yet, Salman saw that there was more to the story, there had to be. Yasir had confirmed it. There was no way that her running away because she was selfish was the true ending. There was something hidden, something not meant to be told.
  
Something that Abdullah knew, but he didn’t.
  
In the end, thanking Yasir once again, he went to his tent to read the letter.