Please see our Publisher’s Note following this month’s Editorial that has important information about a new threat to the survival of all SF/F/H magazines.
“Leave it, you old bat!” Ashraf screamed at his mother-in-law.
He tried to grab Waseefa, but she slid through the rising water like an otter before clawing her way up a Kilimanjaro of possessions. Her litheness was momentarily unhampered by her arthritic limbs decorated with varicose veins. He stood like a fool for some time, staring at the old woman who manically dug through their belongings, while rain desolated most of Pakistan and drenched him.
“Has she found it?” Nabeela asked.
His wife’s voice weaved through the holes in the tiled roof and shattered his trance. Nabeela waited above, holding firmly onto their children, Nadia and Hussain, so that neither would slip and be lost to the rapids.
“Not yet!”
“Hurry up! If the helicopter gets here, we will leave without you!”
“I’ve got it!” Waseefa cackled.
She held up a square box, admiring it. Its ornate silver designed was studded with sapphires, rubies, and pearls. It glinted in refracted light, painting the worn house in riches. Suddenly, a tile collapsed under the weight of the rain, and knocked the box into the water. A single plonk elicited panic.
“You’ve dropped it!” he shouted angrily. “How could you—”
“Look for it!” she ordered, scrambling over.
He bent and peered into the murkiness, then yelped when strong hands forced him underwater. He stared at a foreign world. Small items were carried away through the current. He watched, bubbles periodically escaping through his mouth as Hussain’s prayer mat, a small copper pot, and an empty vase disappeared. His mother-in-law’s face appeared nearby. The water undid her scarf and sent her hair aflutter.
The Kraken, he thought and stifled laughter that would have surely caused him to snort water into his lungs.
Ashraf saw the box, dived, and got a grip on it before it was carried away. When he surfaced, his grandmother clawed it out of his hands. She undid the latch and pulled her most prized possession out. A single stringed bracelet with a wooden pendant. As old as time, as important as sunlight. She remembered why.
• • • •
Waseefa stood barefoot in a field of green encircled by tall trees which rose against a perfect imperishable blue sky. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, inhaling the scents of mud and pine, cloaking herself in peace. When she opened them again, she saw a darkness bloom. It spread, jumping from branch to root and blade, coloring green and brown in shades of rot and decay. In the corner of her eye, Waseefa noticed a light. A fire which began as a single ember. It grew.
It morphed into a winged creature of pure flame. Monstrous, taller than the trees, with hoofs which dug and ripped through earth, horns which impaled the sky. Darkness spread from the Ifrit. She felt it in the coldness of the air, the breath which clung to her insides and refused to come before its presence. Waseefa stared into the black heart of the flame, the chasm in which the horrors of the world are stored. Tendrils of red and white fire reached towards her, seeking to torment her with heat.
The Ifrit lunged and grabbed hold of her arm. Its hand seared her flesh, melted her skin until it was tinged pink and white. She screamed against its laughter.
Waseefa woke. Waves of intensifying pain whirlpooled against her consciousness, dizzying and disorienting her. She saw her worried family in the doorway, and her grandmother kneeling right beside her. The wound smoked, and the cream which her grandmother applied bubbled against the heat.
“Grandma,” Waseefa wept. “What is going on?”
“It is good we are going to Hajj tomorrow,” her grandmother responded cryptically.
• • • •
Waseefa could not describe the emotions which burned through her at the sight of Mecca. She was surrounded by numerous people, more than the entire population of Pakistan. Yet, she did not feel crowded or constricted. She did not long to run away from the noise and chatter. She felt warmed by it, like she had drunk a cup of warm haldi doodh her mother had prepared to alleviate a sickness. Underneath the sunlight, amongst the pale stone and old trees, immersed in symbols of her faith, she felt invulnerable. This feeling was heightened by her mother and grandmother, between whom she stood.
“Shall we?” her mother asked, gesturing towards a group of women who chatted excitedly.
“Not yet,” Waseefa’s grandmother responded.
She hastened towards a nearby tree. All its leaves and flowers had fallen, laid bare by drought, but it was not yet dead. Its trunk was thick and strong, its roots had remained unshaken across the centuries and plunged deep into the ground. Waseefa’s grandmother pulled out a pair of shears.
“Mother!” her daughter hissed.
She cut a twig off one of the branches and stowed it away.
“Now we can go,” Waseefa’s grandmother said, unabashed.
• • • •
Waseefa got into bed. She took a deep breath in, then began to shake on the exhale. Her body ruptured on escalating fear. She tried to calm herself and force the emotion down, knowing that to feel it would only tire her out more than the day had done. She failed.
Wordlessly, her grandmother crept into bed beside her. She slipped a bracelet onto Waseefa’s hand. Blue string with a wooden pendant in the shape of an eye. Her grandmother kissed her hand, then gently lowered her head onto the pillow.
“You are protected,” she promised.
Waseefa closed her eyes and submitted to the exhaustion. She woke to the field of green ringed with trees. Her feet pressed against the earth and her toes dug into the mud, as she stood up. She stared up at the sky, swallowed a gulp of untainted air, and slowly exhaled. Darkness crept across the sky; embers sprung nearby. The Ifrit grew until it towered over her. It bared its teeth. There was flesh in the flame, hers, roasted and blackened. It smelled, and she resisted the urge to gag. The Ifrit took a step toward her. Its movement rattled the ground, making earth croak and grass tremble, and the reverberations struck her feet, harsh enough to make her stumble. It reached for her. Then froze. The Ifrit howled in outrage and anger. She was out of its grasp.
• • • •
“She tried to drown me!” Ashraf shouted.
“Calm down,” Nabeela’s brother responded. They were temporarily sheltering in his home. “She may have done you some good. That box is very valuable and may pay for the rebuilding of your home.”
“But she did not go back in for the box,” Ashraf continued, “she went back in for some simple bracelet.”
Waseefa walked past the living room, unconcerned and unaffected by the conversation. She crept into the barn where Nadia and Hussain rested. He slept unperturbed, wrapped in a thick dry blanket which seemed the most precious thing in the world to him. Nadia writhed. Her sheets were tossed aside, sweat soaked her clothes, and her face was constricted in torment and despair. Waseefa pulled back the collar of Nadia’s dress and saw a burn mark against her skin. She slipped the bracelet onto Nadia’s wrist.
“You are protected,” she promised.
Waseefa stifled a yawn. She was not as young as she used to be, and her energy not as inexhaustible. She would sleep, and the Ifrit would come. It had been patient. It would soon be rewarded.