The Serpent's Daughter (19 page)

“I have never spoken to
jinni
,” countered Jade. She didn’t bother to contradict the first question. The dreams of danger in the grass or elephants trumpeting to her could easily be explained as her mind sorting through likely scenarios in Africa, but there was that blasted knee ache. Ever since she had received the shrapnel wound during the war, it seemed to throb just before something tried to attack her or her closest friends. Now that she thought on it, it had also ached just before she was taken prisoner recently.

“I saw you in the desert and on a mountain. You spoke to an old man, Boguli.”

Jade started as the old woman named the mysterious and aged native tracker that had helped her elude and eventually apprehend the poachers on Mount Marsabit. “Yes, but he wasn’t a
jinn
. He was a …” She hesitated, not knowing the Arabic or French word for “elephant.” Instead she extended her right arm next to her nose and waved it, making trumpeting sounds. From the corner of her eye she could see her mother’s eyes widen, wondering what in the world her daughter was doing now. Then it occurred to Jade, this woman called Zoulikha actually knew about her recent adventure on Mount Marsabit and the northern desert. Either she had very good informants or she really did have some unusual abilities.

“Yes,
Al-Fil
,” said Zoulikha, giving the Arabic word for “elephant.” “
Giwa
in our language.” She smiled, her wrinkled face creasing as she watched Jade’s mouth open in astonishment. “This surprises you.”

“What is going on?” demanded Inez. “What are you talking about?” After Jade explained, her mother said, “We’ll talk about this business of you chasing poachers later, Jade, but with all due respect to our hostess, this is silly. If you are descended from this Dahia, then I am, as well. But
I
don’t talk to spirits or have premonitions.”

Zoulikha anticipated Inez’s argument and answered before Jade could translate her mother’s statement into Arabic. “Your lady mother does not walk with death.” She nodded to Jade’s left leg. “You do. It entered during the war and stayed there. When it did, it awoke that which was hidden inside you.”

“Let us say for the moment that what you say is true, lady
kahina
,” said Jade. “What can I do that you or your daughter cannot do? If you could see me with Boguli, you can surely see who has your talisman.”

Zoulikha’s right hand stopped working the shuttle and her left hand drifted down, still holding the tufts of carded wool. Distress and dismay played in her eyes. “I cannot,” she said softly, “and neither can Yamna. A very powerful
jinn
must hold the knowledge underground. I thought once it was in the old
kaid
’s
kasbah
farther up the valley. I thought that he held it to take away our authority to rule ourselves. He is a stern overlord and often demands many goats from my husband as tribute.”

She resumed her spinning. “Then I saw a great and mighty stone gate made of many arches nesting one over the other. Storks sat upon the top. But now all I see when I look into the spring is dirt and old walls or heaps of goatskins. Something in my heart tells me the amulet is in the red city below the mountain. Sometimes I almost see the charm. It tries to call to me, but it is dim, as if something shadows it as when the moon passes over the sun.”

Jade snapped to attention. “I know that symbol, a moon eclipsing the sun.” She reached into her trouser pocket and pulled out the charm she’d found. “I found this outside the tunnels in Azilah. It was in an owl pellet.” She turned to Inez. “This symbol was also on a note left for me in our rooms after I came back from Azilah.”

As she turned back and forth, her sleeve brushed the leather satchel that still hung around her neck. “I nearly forgot about this. I took this pouch from one of the rooms in the
riad
.” The front was coated in dried clay from where it had been dragged through the culverts, but now a bit of dirt fell away, revealing a golden-colored glint. Jade put the charm back into her pocket, grabbed the end of her skirt, and used it as a rag to wipe away the grime. As she did, she exposed the tooled image of a full moon nearly covering the sun. The sun had been embossed with a bronze leaf, while the moon was stained black. “See? It’s here, as well.”

The old
kahina
reached across for the bag, so she could inspect it more closely. “Yes,” she croaked. “That is the symbol of the most powerful of the
jenniya
. The one that Adam first took to wife before our Lord God made Eve. To pronounce the name of any of the people of the night is to invoke them. King Sulaiman, son of David, could do so because of his magic ring. But to pronounce
her
name could mean death.” She handed the bag back to Jade. “Cover it up. Do not let her see her symbol lest she come for it.”

Jade turned the bag upside down, not out of fear of mythical
jinni,
but to respect the old woman’s beliefs and wishes. As she did so, she shuddered.
Lilith
. That was who Zoulikha meant. Again that woman’s name came up. Jade always suspected that someone had steamed open her mother’s letter to her last January in Nairobi. Someone spying on her, trying to find information. The only person with a motive to do that was Olivia Lilith Worthy. That meant the woman had known of Jade’s plans to meet Inez in Tangier.
It would be like her to assume the symbol of a legendary demon whose name she bore
. And Avery had said she’d left London.

“I don’t see how you can help them, Jade,” said Inez after Jade explained the situation. “She should send some of her own people to find this talisman. Marrakech is a big city. You don’t even know where to begin looking.”

“I think I understand why they need me, Mother. The
kahina
Zoulikha is, of course, too old to make the trip. Her daughter is too valuable to risk. She’s the next in line. Besides, she has a baby to care for.”

“And you, on the other hand, are expendable? I don’t think so. Let her send some of her men. That Bachir can go.”

“You don’t understand, Mother. You and I may not believe in them, but these people fear these spirits. They won’t, they
can’t
try to fight one.”

“Well, that still doesn’t mean you have to,” argued Inez. “Let them get one of the French officers in Marrakech to help if they cannot.”

“Do you honestly think they would listen? Or care?” Jade placed a hand on her mother’s shoulder and held it there. “Besides, Mother, I made a promise to help. I do not go back on my word.”

“You were probably tricked into making that promise,” muttered Inez. “Always doing foolish things, rushing in to save someone. Risking yourself in that horrid war.”

Jade sighed. “That’s what Beverly tells me, too. But, Mother, that promise was the price for your freedom. I wouldn’t have found you without Bachir’s help.”

Zoulikha tended to her spindle during this conversation; her daughter made the final preparations for the meal. Inez spoke to them first.

“How is my daughter supposed to find this talisman? And if this
jenniya
is so strong, how can I be sure my daughter will be safe?” She turned to Jade. “Translate for me, please.” Jade did.

“The talisman has much
baraka,
holiness, to it,” answered Zoulikha. “It will try to hide lest someone unholy wear it and it loses its holiness. It will recognize a daughter of Dahia and call to Jade. Your daughter has already proven that she can control some of the night people. That is how she was able to command the ones in her prison to chew her bonds. It is how she went through the underground pipes without harm.”

“And will my Jade be able to command this dark
jenniya
you speak of?”

Zoulikha shook her head. “This one is too powerful. Her symbol is very evil. But if Jade can get Elishat’s amulet, she will be safe.”

Inez grumbled a bit under her breath about obstinate, headstrong daughters and reached for the leather pouch. “I’m not afraid of this symbol. I want to see what it looks like.” When she hefted the bag, she paused. “Feels a bit heavier than what I would expect for something this small.”

Jade reached for the bag. “I hadn’t noticed, but then I had it around my neck and across my chest the entire trip.” She also held it in the air, testing its weight. “I see what you mean. It does feel heavy.”

She drew the guard’s knife from her boot sheath, ignoring her mother’s startled outburst that she’d even have a place in her footwear to hide a knife. After squeezing the bag along the sides and bottom, she inserted the knife point along a seam and slit upward. “It’s not one layer thick, but two. There’s a secret pocket sewn in each side and, I think, another on the bottom.”

Jade put down the knife and slipped her slender fingers into the bottom pouch. “I can feel at least five coins in here.” She withdrew a solid gold Roman coin.
“Septimus Severus,”
she said as she read the inscription. She tipped the bag and let the other four coins spill out.

“What’s in the side pockets?” asked Inez. “More gold?” She reached for the coins and inspected them.

Jade felt inside the narrow pouch. “Not gold, but something else that might be worth killing for.” She pulled out a small paper bundle and sliced it open, exposing a dark reddish-brown brick. “Monsieur Deschamp claims you’ve been smuggling hashish, Mother. I think I found it.”

CHAPTER 15

—The Traveler

IF JADE HAD ANY HESITATION about assisting the Berbers before, it vanished when she saw the hashish. Their fates were somehow bound together. She didn’t know who Patrido de Portillo worked for, but he was involved. It was a start. Talking about it wouldn’t make her mother happy, but Jade couldn’t let that stop her.

“I’ll leave tomorrow morning,” Jade said first in Arabic, then in English for her mother’s benefit. Immediately both Zoulikha and Inez protested her decision, the old
kahina
for practical reasons.

“You are not ready, Jade,” Zoulikha said. “Your mules must rest. Bachir must rest.
You
must rest. You have
baraka,
but it is not enough. There is much I must teach you.” She motioned to her daughter to serve some food. Yamna, who had just resumed her weaving at the great loom, rose and filled two bowls with steamed couscous topped with chunks of onions and cucumbers and something that looked like eggplant seasoned with cumin. She handed the first bowl to Inez.

“How do I tell her thank you?” asked Inez.

“In Arabic, you say
shukran
.” Jade repeated the word to Yamna as she took the second bowl.

“Shukran,”
said Inez. She looked at the bowl in confusion, uncertain how she should eat this. “There’s no fork,” she whispered to Jade.

“Use your right hand, Mother. Never use your left. It’s considered unclean. And remember to say
besmellāh
before you begin.” Jade had only had a little practice herself with this style of eating, but she managed to roll a bit of vegetable into a ball of couscous and pop it into her mouth after first saying the blessing word. Her mother, to Jade’s surprise, deftly rolled up a tidy ball of the steamed grains as if she’d done so all her life.

“It’s very good,” said Inez. Jade agreed and passed on their praises to Yamna. “Are you not eating?”

Yamna explained that they would all share in a large meal that evening, but knew their guests would be hungry now. Then, satisfied that everyone was well served with more hot mint tea, she returned to her loom, her daughter now asleep at her feet.

Jade watched the younger woman pass the wool by hand through the warp strands. Then she raised the heddle, a rod balanced on stones on either side of the loom, to raise the alternate warp threads, and passed the wool through in the opposite direction. Her dexterity spoke of long practice from an early age, the rhythm second nature. Most of the strands were brown and white, but now Yamna began to run a red stripe through them. Jade recalled the stripes she’d seen on Bachir’s cloak and the eyelike design in the center back.

Zoulikha looked up from her spinning and studied Jade’s interest. “Weaving is our life,” she said. “We have a saying: Life is a loom, and God holds the threads. And when a woman has a baby, we tell her that her weaving has been granted happiness.”

“What is the symbol on the back of your cloaks?” asked Jade.

Yamna nodded to the bird sitting in the cage nearby. “It is the eye of the partridge. It keeps watch against evil.” She pointed towards some designs on the grain bin. “The sheaves of grain represent fertility. The design from the
kasbah
roof means ‘fortress,’ or ‘strength.’ ” She looked across to her mother and smiled.

Jade caught the glance exchanged between them as she ate another ball of couscous and onion.
Looks like my education has already begun
.

“Finish eating,” Zoulikha said, “and we will walk.”

Jade quickly downed her food, licked her fingers clean, and rose. Her mother, not knowing what had been said since Jade hadn’t translated, did the same. From the look on her face, Jade could see she had no intention of letting her daughter out of her sight.

“What are we doing?” asked Inez.

“Taking a walk, Mother. Care to join us?” It was a rhetorical question at best, and Jade didn’t wait for the obvious answer. Instead she gave a hand to Inez before she crossed over to Zoulikha and assisted the old woman to her feet.

Outside, Jade was once again struck by the efficiency with which the village scaled the rocky mountainside, making use of unfarmable land. Now from this height, she also noted the breathtaking beauty of their valley. A stream wended its way a hundred feet below, carrying snowmelt from the higher peaks. As it meandered in the more level plain, it watered their flocks and crops. As far as there was a water channel, there grew a verdant belt like a living green ribbon.