THE DHOW SAILED through a crescent-shaped natural harbor and into a wide manmade canal. It was dawn, and the sky was white. Stone quays edged the canal, shadowed by the thick ocher walls of a crenellated fortress with high watchtowers at each turn. Beyond the fortress, low gray and tan buildings lined the channel. The dhow’s sailors jumped from the deck, dragging ropes and pulling the craft into a berth. A plank was dropped, and Luc and his fellow captives hobbled ashore, where a crowd gathered. Robed and turbaned boys and gangs of young bearded men lunged, making faces and even pummeling the fettered captives as they stumbled on their weak and rocky sea legs. As Hassan steered Luc and the four other captives through the city and along the shadowed streets, the crowd followed, whistling, jeering, and threatening the prisoners. At a city square, ringed by low windowless buildings, the prisoners filed down rickety steps to an underground warren of hot, hellish cells, a matamore. A grate in the slimy ceiling opened to the street and yielded a dribble of air and less light. Moldy, lice-infested straw mats covered the mud floor. The door clanged shut. Luc listened to the sounds of the city above and the weeping of his fellow captives. He was beyond weeping, beyond thinking. Luc was empty.
Before the end of the first day ashore, the dhow captain and Hassan, now turbaned and robed in sky-blue cloth, returned to the matamore and led the prisoners up to the street. The afternoon sun blinded Luc and his fellow captives as they were prodded to a pen on the edge of the square, where a small group of men waited. All were mustached and many had pointed beards. They wore long robes with wide sleeves and had covered their heads with turbans or small round caps. A few stepped forward to examine the captives, forcing them to strip off their clothes and jump and bend and skip. Fingers poked into mouths and pulled down eyelids. Two customers admired Luc’s hair but drew back when they saw he had one ear. The captain displayed Mattie’s carved ear. For a moment Luc was flooded with memories of home, and tears streamed from his eyes. The men laughed and moved on to the next captive. At the edge of the group, a singular man watched. He was old and taller by a head then any other man, taller even than the blue-robed Hassan. The old man was thin, with a lined, narrow face and a trim white beard. He wore a white cap and a long white robe, all spotless as milk, except for his butter-colored pointed shoes. With him was a very short man with a bare, bald head and a crooked smile. He was dressed in a striped gray robe with a pointed hood that hung behind him. Although he was the height of a young boy, he had the face and the broad shoulders of a man. The old man motioned at Luc with a nod of his head, and the little man scampered over to the captain.
“How much for the boy with one ear?” asked the little man. Luc understood nothing as they began to haggle about his worth.
The captain looked down at the little man and frowned. “Two gold pieces.”
“You’re mad,” screeched the little man.
The captain drew a small, curved dagger from his belt.
The little man ducked his head and put up his hands. He simpered. “Forgive me, kind sir. I meant only the price is too high. The boy is not whole. Can he hear?”
“As well as you. Maybe better. You’re but half a man.”
The little man smiled and thumped his head. “Yes, yes. Less than half a man, sayyid, but no one says his own buttermilk is sour. Not when he wants to sell the buttermilk.”
“What?” asked the captain.
“This boy is worth little. Maybe nothing. Maybe less than nothing,” said the little man, flicking his teeth with his right thumbnail.
“His hair alone is worth the price,” said the captain, cleaning his fingernails with the tip of his dagger.
“What use is a head of hair?” asked the little man, rubbing his bald head. “Just a luxury bed for vermin.”
The captain shrugged. “Get on with it. One gold piece for the boy. That, or move on.”
“A fair bargain,” said the little man, bobbing his head up and down. “Do we agree, you will pay my master a gold piece to take the boy?”
The captain spit on the ground. “Infernal dwarf. Be gone.” He tucked his dagger back into his belt and turned to walk away.
“The boy has one ear. He is bad luck. It is risky to bring such a thing into a household,” the little man called loudly.
The captain’s face reddened, and he turned around. “A piece of silver, and the boy is yours, but take him and get out of my sight before I use my knife on your ear.”
The little man nodded and pulled a silver coin from a leather sack. The captain motioned to Hassan, who removed the shackles from Luc’s scabbed and bleeding ankles. The tall sailor patted Luc’s head gently before he tied a rope around the boy’s neck. When he tried to hand over the rope, Hassan was ignored. Instead, the little man pulled at the captain’s robe.
The captain narrowed his eyes. “Now what?”
The little man held out his hand and cocked his head.
“What?” asked the captain again.
“You have our boy’s other ear.”
“You did not buy the other ear. You bought the boy with one ear.”
“My master bought the boy. Surely the wooden ear belongs to the boy. Now both belong to my illustrious master.”
“Who is your master?”
The little man pointed to the tall man in white, who stood apart from the crowd. The old man nodded, and the captain touched the tips of the fingers of his right hand to his forehead and bowed slightly. He tossed the ear to the little man.
“Your master is a very respected man. But you are nothing. Stay out of my sight, or beware, insect.”
The little man dropped the wooden ear into his hood and winked. As he led Luc away, he looked over his shoulder at the captain. With a wide smile and a second wink, he whispered loudly, “The right answer to a fool is silence.”
“What? What did that troll say?” asked the captain.
But Hassan, who heard every word, spit out a red kola seed and shrugged. Then he called to the little man.
“His name is Luc.”
The little man stopped and turned. He pointed a thumb to his own chest. “Bes,” he said, and he bowed to Hassan. Bes turned to Luc, tapped his chest again, and repeated his name. When Luc said nothing, he frowned and jerked the rope. Luc stumbled after Bes, who trotted a few paces behind the tall man in white.
Bes pulled Luc through the narrow streets, yanking the leash and causing Luc to stumble and sometimes fall to his knees. Bes laughed each time until the old man turned, wagged his finger, and clicked his tongue. Bes shrugged and cocked his head to one side. “Yes, master,” he said. But when the old man turned, Bes jerked Luc one last time and stuck out his tongue at the boy.
Along crowded streets, through narrow alleys and under covered archways, the three passed stalls selling leather slippers, copper cauldrons, and bolts of cloth. They passed mountains of almonds and dried dates and bushels of grains and green vegetables. There were tables stacked with brightly colored sweets, round loaves of bread, and noisy pens of hens and chicks. Blood-spattered butchers called from beneath fly-covered hooks of skinned lambs and goats. The trio stepped aside to let donkey carts pass, and everywhere they went, people bowed to the old man, calling out, “Salaam alaikum.”
Although the sun was hotter than home, Luc was shivering. He inhaled the scents of cumin and turmeric and burned sugar; he saw bolts of cloth in shades of saffron, orchid, and indigo. He heard people talking, arguing, and singing, in words he could not understand. Nothing was familiar to Luc. Nothing was identifiable. Then, as he hobbled along, he noticed a man carving wood with a pointed chisel, etching an intricate design of vines and flowers. Luc stopped to watch. Bes tugged at him. The rough rope scratched and burned Luc’s neck, a harsh reminder of his status. He was naked and leashed.
Like a pig, Luc thought. A pig to be slaughtered.
He shuddered, and his hands were icy. Bes jerked the rope, and Luc fell to his knees. The old man had turned down an alley ahead. Bes grabbed a handful of Luc’s hair and yanked the boy to his feet. He hurried Luc along, catching up with the old man at a long whitewashed wall; swallows nested in every hole in the wall, and twigs and grasses jutted from every fissure. Bes dragged Luc to a carved doorway and swung open an iron-studded cedar door. The huge hammered hinges squealed. The old man entered, and Bes jerked Luc over the threshold into his new home.