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‘You must acknowledge the truth, Aicha!’
At any other moment? That overfamiliarity might have been the final snapping point. Where I snapped something off him. Then possibly fed it to him afterwards.
‘You must shut up now, Zakariya!’ I hiss at him.
All my attention stays riveted on the creature in front of me. I am from a people who appreciate horses, who love the equine in both capacity and beauty. Many are the poems written to describe a single, particular stallion’s grace. The way their muscles ripple beneath sheen-coated skin in a movement that flows like shifting sands. The hammering beat of hooves travelling up the backbone until you can taste them in your teeth. I have had horses I valued more highly than any of my people, my family. And who proved their worth more than any of them too.
This is not a horse. No. This is what horses might pray to when left alone and the dark draws in.
It is white. Something that, in itself, marks out the creature. I have never yet seen a white horse. Heard tell of them, but they have never come to the shores I’ve crossed. Not at home in Morocco. Not across the Caliphate as I travelled east.
And then there is the size.
Were a giant of legend – Sufax, perhaps, or Teryiel herself to climb onto its back, I doubt it would bow or break. Its fetlock reaches my chest at an estimate. Beautiful as it is, I’m not about to approach and measure myself against it. Because I can see its eyes.
These are not the dewy, lash-crowned eyes of a soft-hearted mare. Nor the staring challenge of a stallion in heat. Not even the maddened blood-streaked gaze of a wild and wounded horse, blood and foam flecking its muzzle.
No. These are the eyes of something else. A creature one would make an error in mistaking for a beast. Clever. Cunning. And very aware.
Zakariya has caught on now. It took him a moment as he was spluttering in outrage. I have no doubt he was preparing to launch into a diatribe. How dare I? Who do I think I am?
I know who I am. That is why I dare. And no man will force me not to. My own choice. Always.
Luckily for him, the gigantic horn-crowned equus has now caught his eye. And his head twists, his mouth dropping open to gape. Amazement. Perhaps something else. I see the widening of his eyes, then the narrowing. Fear? Contemplation?
Avarice?
‘Shadhavar!’ One word, hardly said. A breath more than a word. It catches me by surprise. Tickles a half-remembered story told among the heat of the cooking sands. Huddled in the shade, waiting for the moment to dig dinner back out of the ground. Tales to the children from the collective mothers in the palm-shadows.
Shadhavar. The hollow-horned horse. Of course. Zakariya shows, for a moment, his scholarly leanings. The knowledge and learning accrued. The wisdom that gained him the position of Anointed One.
Before the title went to his head, apparently choking out the aforementioned wisdom as it went. At least based on our time together. And, of course, based on what he does next.
The shadhavar tosses its head. Its mane spreads and shimmers like a thousand filigrees of white-gold thread. Muscles bunch in the glistening neck, thicker than my chest. And the horn…
Sings.
Not loud. Not a celebratory chant of male victory in war or over women, the sort sung after battle or before bed. Nor the keening high notes of the elders. Or the songs when the women gather in private. Where whispers of who we once were, who we should be might get passed about.
No. This is more like the hush lowing of a mother to a beloved offspring. One who is distressed, restless. When they seek to calm with soothing noises that need no syllables. Just a message passed to their child. Reassurance. “Here I am, and here you are.” A promise of place, that all is right in the world.
Such is the promise the notes carry across the clearing to us. Peace. Belonging. It is wonderful. Wondrous, even. Something to be drunk in, luxuriated in. A creature of such rarity that even for those awake to the world below, the world of talent, it is but a tale. And a tune gifted to us that, perhaps, no others in our time will ever hear. Something beyond precious.
Zakariya steps forward. The movement pulls my attention back to him. The glitter in his eyes is not tears.
‘They say,’ he murmurs, his eyes transfixed on the creature across from us. Not by the song though. ‘They say Umayya ibn Abd Shams himself, God’s mercy to him, owned the horn of a shadhavar. That when the weight of the caliphate or the grief of life bore down upon him, he would bring it from his most guarded of storerooms and play but a single note on it. And all the shadows would flee from his soul.’
He takes another step. ‘And that when he played two notes to gathered nobles and dignitaries, all would weep and acknowledge him the greatest of men.’
Ah. Of course. That is what he takes from this present we have been gifted. A further opportunity for stature.
‘Zakariya…’ I try to breathe so much into that one soft word. Warning. Caution. Threat. Promise. Whether from the shadhavar or from myself.
He hears none of it. Of course he doesn’t. Instead he steps forward once more…
And the shadhavar startles.
Its head twists towards him. Notes roll out, wind-guided down the branches, through the horn’s hollow. The tune is jauntier, edgier. Its front hooves scuff, then push. The creature rears up, tree high. Not male, apparently. Or, at least, I see no manhood. Perhaps I do it a disservice to assume it would be so proudly displayed as a stallion. Or a man.
