He leads me through parts of death I’ve never been in, parts I am cut off from being only Hakawati.
How does a jinn boy like him travel through more of death than a Hakawati like me?
I feel my suspicions against him rise up, and I wonder, What isn’t he telling me?
But Rami continues leading me on through the area. Through parts that are filled with colors more hazy than rich-bodied. The air is still, more like a weight, and I feel we are moving through pomegranate molasses. With every breath I take, I taste a rich sweetness on the back of my tongue, but it’s followed by a slight rot, as if the sweetness is trying to mask it.
And when I look down at my feet, there’s sand. I walk ahead, my feet kicking up dust and sand the color of an orange rind.
“Where is this?” I ask.
“Bab al-Sahra,” Rami says. “Desert Gate.”
The breeze here coats sand all over my skin and forces me to squint my eyes to keep grit from getting into them. I want to say something, but I’m afraid sand will clog my throat. I’m holding my arm up to my face now, trying to protect my mouth and eyes and nose. But it settles in my ears, sitting on my eyelashes, clogging my throat.
I cough and sputter and try to spit out the sand in my mouth. I can feel its graininess, like I’m chewing through rubble.
“Ah,” Rami mutters, just as the wind dies down. I blink a few times and rub grit out of my eyes. We’re in a tunnel now, made of glass and vines and wood. Beyond the glass, the sand is still whipping about, but nothing touches me.
Hanging every few feet from the vines and wood are small orbs caked with sand.
“Take a bite when you find a red one,” he tells me.
As I pass under one of the white fruits—I guessed they were a fruit of some kind—sand crumbles off its face, revealing a thick red skin underneath.
“Pomegranates.”
“Fruit of life” he says. “These are Sahra Pomegranates. Without them, you can’t enter the Sahra realm.”
Rami takes one, brushing sand from its face. He slices the skin with a long, sharp fingernail, then pulls out a handful of seeds and presses them against my forehead. “This will be the mark that lets you past the gate. Eating the seeds also helps protect your own soul from deteriorating. Make sure to eat as much as your stomach can hold.” I feel juice from the seeds run down my forehead and drip off my nose, and I wipe at it, drinking some of the liquid off my finger.
I stop walking. “Wait,” I say, the pomegranate weighing heavy in my hand.
He pauses and cocks his head at me.
“Sand,” I say, more to myself. “Pomegranates. I know the story. Or parts of it, really.”
Earth fashioned a being made of clay and sand and made golems.
Sea made a creature of salt and water and made marids.
Sky took air and cloud, wisps and rain, and made ghouls.
Fire took ash and smoke and made jinns.
“We are going to see Earth herself,” I muse.
“She is older than the earth, but she is Earth, yes.”
“She created golems,” I add. “To help.”
Rami scowls. “She did, yes, long ago. But since then, she has done very little for anyone or anything but herself.”
“What do you mean?” I begin, but he cuts me off by slicing his hand through the air.
“That story is not your concern, Hakawati. All you need to do is tell your little stories. No more, no less, and only when the time comes.”
I close my mouth and say nothing as he leads us through the tunnel.
Keep quiet, Hakawati. Just keep quiet, don’t upset him, and keep your head level. I want to tell him that I am Hakawati, that I have been telling the stories of the dead for years, and that these stories aren’t little stories, as he calls them. They are the tales the dead pay to get through Mote.
Instead, I shove more of the pomegranate seeds into my mouth to keep from talking, dropping pieces of the thick peel behind me as I walk.
“Here we are,” he says, pausing before a door. It’s also glass, but I can’t see through it to what’s behind. He raps his knuckles twice on the door and steps back.
A small creature, no taller than my knees, opens the door. It’s made of clay, alive as much as Saqr ever is when I’ve animated him.
“Ahlan, Ahlan,” the golem says to us both as it steps aside to let us through, a false smile on its face. “Mother’s been expecting you to show up. Though I don’t think she’s happy.”