Katarina poured the tea, the one that had the hint of mint and dandelions that she knew her father Gregor preferred. While she poured, she tried not to let her gaze drift to him as they sat silently on cushions there in the main room of their small home, trying to enjoy osnar, the meal that signified the end of the workday, and the time for family and friends.
Her mother sat opposite her in a flowing robe of sea-foam green, a loose scarf of matching silk around her shoulders. Her hair, black, thick, and long with soft waves that held just the fewest of gray hairs, was worn loose there at the end of the day. The siroccos that had blown into the city of Almad had carried those irritating tiny grains of sand that seemed to get everywhere, no matter how tightly closed doors and shutters might have been.
Like her mother, she had worn her headscarf, more to keep out the sand from her mouth and nose than from a devotion to the teachings of Al Mazhir. Her mother had been from the Belhoun tribes to the south, and her father had been a salt trader, so she had not been a follower of the major religion of the Empire of Zahirah.
Katarina had owed her dark hair and graceful limbs to her mother's people, while she had owed her blue eyes and slightly paler skin to her father's own, as some would have called it, foreign blood. Her father had been a large bear of a man, with a voice that could be booming with laughter one moment and growling low like distant thunder the next. He had been fair-haired and had taken to growing his beard short and well-groomed as many of the merchants and well-to-do of that city had done.
But his pale blue eyes, his almost permanently sun-reddened skin, and his towering height had marked him forever as an outsider. To Katarina's knowledge, while she might have spied others in the city who had not been from the many lands that had been ruled by the Golden Caliphate and his many armies and mighty magics, none had lived there like her father.
She had known his story well, as she had dutifully spooned tiny measures of crystallized honey into the tall, thin glass of tea. A silversmith by trade, he had spent many years as a sailor when, in his far lands of high mountains and ice and snow, he could not make a living at his trade. It had been on one of the trading vessels from across the wide Sapphire Main that he had wound up in that city by the sea. It had been by chance again that Gregor had met, and fallen in love with, her mother Saleema.
Like a story out of olden times, she had chosen love over duty, and Katarina had heard many times the tale of how Saleema's brothers had come to kill that foreigner who would have shamed their family, only to return to the desert bloodied and bruised. When Saleema's family had chosen to bring their blood feud to the courts of the Sultan of Almad, it had been a close thing. And yet, their story had moved the heart of the Princess of Almad, and they had been allowed to marry.
But there had been a price. No foreigner had ever been allowed to leave the trading cities of the Zahirah Empire to travel further into the interior, under the penalty of death. That decree had been in effect for generations, for some reason best known to the Golden Caliphs of old. And so, Gregor had been told that if his love had been so strong that he would have faced death from Saleema's family, then he would have been protected, but only if he had never left the city again. So he could never have returned home and had to have forever been the loving, loyal husband, giving up his old life and ways for those of the Empire.
As Katarina's mother had liked to say with a wistful smile; there had not even been a heartbeat's pause in her father's acceptance of the decree. And so they had wed, and he had plied his skills as a silversmith to the more readily available metals of brass bronze, and copper. Those had been hard years at the beginning, but their love had stayed strong, regardless of the shunning of Saleema by others of the Belhoun tribes, and the constant competition from other merchants and smiths in that city. He had had to work twice as hard and at half the pay many times, just to have earned enough for the two of them.
But his clever work had eventually been noticed, and he had gathered a small, but grudgingly loyal group of customers, and on occasion, some contracts and commissions from other merchants over the years.
And then Katarina had come along, completing their family. Within their home, her life had been filled with laughter and love, but outside their simple walls, she had known that there had existed distrust of foreigners, especially those whose blood had not been one of the many proud peoples of the Empire of Zahirah. And her skin, and most telling, her eyes, had marked her forever as a half-blood and tainted. Although she had heard far worse over the years.
But it had been none of those things that had caused the tension around their table that night. She had finished stirring her father's tea and had placed it before him, then she and her parents had broken off a piece of the flat nan-e-barbari bread and had dipped it into the small plate of salt in the center of the table. They had each taken a bite, as tradition had mandated, in silence, before she had put hers down, then like a dutiful daughter, had reached for the large bronze spoon and had begun to dole out the baghali-polo to her father first, then her mother, who had been watching her with dark and disappointed eyes.
She had dipped her toe into the treacherous waters as she had spooned a serving for herself last. "Goli and I heard that ghouls had been spotted in the Low Quarter. That was why so many of the Javidan were patrolling the streets there," she had said lightly, her blue eyes wide with feigned interest.
Her mother had sipped her tea, pursing her lips a bit at her, glancing at Gregor. Katarina had looked her father's way as he had sat, still and silent on his cushion, his tea and baghali untouched before him. He had worn a dark expression on his face as he had looked at her. Katarina's heart had broken as her fear had finally washed over her. She had known she had hurt her father, although that had never been her intention, and that look of disappointment in his eyes had cut her deeply. Her lip had trembled slightly, but she had sat composed, waiting.
Finally, he had sighed, closing his eyes as he had rubbed at his mouth with one of his big, meaty, yet dexterous hands. He had pinched the bridge of his nose, then had opened his eyes again.
"Katarina," he had said, her name a grumble in his throat. "Why did you throw dung at the Hanan?" Katarina had not been able to meet his tired and defeated gaze. "Why?"
Why indeed. Katarina had not meant to lose her anger at the Hanan, one of the many, many judges who had arbitrated on behalf of those who had lived in one of the dozens of kadiluks around the city. They had been men of wealth and influence and power and had been respected, and a little feared for what their judgments could have done to a person or a family.
She had been minding her own business, returning to the shop with the thin copper plates her father would have used in a hundred different ways when that officious fat man had struck that poor girl asking for alms. She had been starving, and Katarina had seen her around the stalls and shops many times over the last few months. She, herself, had dropped a bronze coin or two her way, even half a loaf of day-old bread.
Katarina had heard that the girl's mother and sisters had died of the fever a season past, and this had been what she had been reduced to. She had never stolen and had been quiet and mousy, dressed in rags. But she had made the mistake of reaching out a hand to beg, and that fat Hanan had swung his walking stick straight across the girl's face, then while the girl had been down, had kept stabbing at her with the point of his stick while he had yelled curses at her for daring to approach him.
Something had boiled over in Katarina, and dropping the copper plates, she had yelled at the man as she had run across the cobbled street. He had been ignoring her, so intent on him to teach this beggar a lesson, that Katarina had had to resort to something drastic to get the man's attention.
So, in a city with horses and camels, there had always been a fresh weapon at hand. She had reached down, and taking a stinking, hot handful of dung, had flung it with surprising accuracy at the man. He had turned when she had yelled again, and the noisome missile had struck him on the chin, neck, and chest, the handful making an arc across his ear and in his eye.
He had sputtered and stumbled back; the beggar had scampered off like a mouse sensing an opening to live another day. Katarina herself had decided that perhaps the beggar had had the right idea and had turned to run when she had remembered the copper plates. She had looked, and they had been gone, the victim of her inattention. So she had run, all the way back home.
It had not taken long before a Javidan guard had been at the shop with the still-stinking Hanan. There had followed a long, loud discussion that Katarina, hiding in the kitchen in the farthest room opposite the shop in the front, had barely followed. But she had caught the cursing, again and again. And through it all, her father's calming voice had been deep and complacent, and to Katarina's mounting shame, pleading.
The voices had eventually diminished, with a final surge of yelling, a bit of crashing, and then...silence. Katarina had stayed where she had been, unsure of what to do next when her father had finally found her. He had stood at the doorway, looking at her quietly. She had waited for the outburst, for the yelling. She had fully expected him to find a willow switch somewhere and had beaten her, although he had never raised an angry hand to her in her life. Instead, he had told her to wash up and to help her mother with dinner. Then he had left to tend to the shop.
Her mother, though, had had no such compunctions about corporal punishment. She had come in from the market, and Katarina, exiling herself to the kitchen, had heard her mother come into the front and had been speaking to her father. There had been more discussion, her mother's voice rising, her father's voice a quiet rumble. Then her mother had been at the doorway. Katarina had been standing over the small stone well in the tiny courtyard in the back where the hot coals had been laid, and she had been stirring the rice in the boiling pot on the chain over the stove when her mother had stalked towards her, her eyes flashing.
Katarina had opened her mouth to speak when her mother had slapped her. The shock of it had frozen both of them for a moment. Saleema had been, in some ways, still a traditional Belhoun, and they had raised their children to fear the rod and the whip. The young woman had remembered more than a few nights when she could not have slept on her tender backside from some infraction or another. But her mother had never slapped her before. Her eyes had stung from the heat on her cheek as she had held her hand there, her mother's lips pressed tightly together.
"Life is hard enough for us," Saleema had said with heat in her voice. "For your father, for you. And now this? Do you even understand what you have done? Do you?" Katarina had opened her mouth to protest, but the look on her mother's face had meant she had not been asking her to answer. "Finish, then prepare the table. I must speak to your father and pray to Isrimah the Blessed we are not thrown out of our own home for this." Katarina had known her mother rarely called upon the gods of the desert tribes unless she had been desperate...or furious.
And now there she had been, her father finally speaking to her, to justify why she had called down so much trouble onto their home.
Katarina, her cheeks red and tear-stained, struggled to explain. "Da, I didn't plan to throw dung at the Hanan. It was... it was anger, injustice boiling inside me. He was beating that beggar girl, the one who lost her mother and sister last year, just for asking for alms. He was brutal, and I shouted at him to stop, but he ignored me. I grabbed the dung without thinking and... I threw it at him. I never meant to hit him, but I did."
Gregor sighed, then reached forward, taking the tall glass of tea with its brass holder and handle, and sipped at it. He set it down, quiet for a long moment before speaking again.
"I can understand your intent, but I cannot condone your actions." His eyes were full of weary sadness as he spoke. "We have to make our way through a world that is full of injustices and cruelty. The best we can hope for is to carve out a small portion of happiness for ourselves and our loved ones. I have worked very hard to give you and your mother a home you can feel safe and loved in."
He stopped, gathering his thoughts. "What you did...put all of that at risk." He looked long at his daughter. "Were this any other city, any other land, I would have taken a whip to that Hanan myself for the arrogant fool he is," This brought a disapproving look from Saleema, and eased the tight grip around Katarina's heart a bit.
"But," he continued, "we are here, in a land with hard laws and rigid ways. And that sometimes means we must swallow our anger...and our pride," he said softly, "if only to make our way quietly and safely, and to keep our own lives secure."
He looked to Saleema, as if he was about to say more, but remained silent. Her mother looked at Katarina. "Your father and I have spoken. It is time to announce that you are of age to be engaged."
The words struck with a greater sting than her mother's slap. "What?!" she blurted out. "No! I...I-" Saleema's look was hard and cut her off.
"You are a beautiful young woman, Katya," she called her by her childhood nickname. "Women your age often begin the rites of courtship. We will seek out a husband of proper standing, one who will elevate you, who will learn to love you, and to whom you will learn responsibility and respect. You must turn aside childish and unwomanly ways." Her look softened. "This is for the best."
Those words caused a chill to seep into her body, regardless of the warmth of the home. This went deep into her soul. She had acted with what she knew, she knew to be the right thing. And now, she was going to be handed this sentence of death. Or, it might as well be. Her cheek still stung from her mother's slap and now she was going to be foisted off to some man she did not know, as if she was some animal being traded. All for a bit of honor or influence that some prospective husband might bring.
She looked down at the necklace that hung around her neck. It was better than the hard eyes of her mother. "I honor you, mother. But you might as well put me in a grave before I marry some stranger!" Katarina grabbed a knife from the table, tears hot on her face. She slapped it down next to her father on the table. "If this is my punishment, then take this knife to my heart! I will not marry anyone!" The words escaped her mouth, but the fear of what the Hanan might do to her family, and the anger at the seeming betrayal of her parents loosened her tongue beyond her control. She could see her father's face and watched the pain cloud his expression. But she was just too hurt, too angry to stop.
The look on her father's face was as stricken as if she had taken the knife to his own heart. His lips pressed tighter together, as if holding back his tongue. But her mother had no such compunction.
She slammed her hand down with such force the tea glasses jumped. "HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO YOUR FATHER LIKE THIS! YOU WOULD BRING SUCH TROUBLE TO THIS HOUSE WHEN HE HAS WORKED SO LONG-"
Katarina stood now, shaking. She was so angry and hurt at this betrayal, unaware of the knife still in her hand as she pointed it towards her mother. "YOU WOULD SPEAK OF BETRAYAL? WHAT OF ME? YOU WOULD BETRAY YOUR DAUGHTER FOR WHAT?" She shook her fist at her mother, the small knife gleaming. "FOR YOUR PRIDE? WHERE IS THE WOMAN WHO TURNED HER BACK ON HER OWN FAMILY FOR THE LOVE OF A GOOD MAN? AND NOW YOU WISH TO...TO...To..."
She was running out of energy, the tears hot on her face as her mother stood, her dark eyes flashing, her robes whirling. Katarina stepped back instinctively in the face of her mother's anger as she stepped around the table towards her daughter.
Suddenly, she was looming over Katarina, gripping her wrist painfully as she brought the knife to her chest. "I tried to raise you to be a good daughter," her voice a hot hiss now, "and this is what we get; a daughter who cares so little for her father and mother that she would try to tear down everything we did for her." She pressed the tip of the knife against the robes, twisting Katarina's wrist painfully. "You've already harmed the heart of your father, now it is my turn," she squeezed until Katarina cried out, Saleema's tears finally spilling from her own eyes.
"ENOUGH!" Gregor's below shook the room as he finally stood. Saleema looked at him, about to yell in anger, but he had a look that Katarina had not seen on his face before; it was hard and terrible, a mask that had fallen over her father's face.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
Saleema seemed to recognize this and let go as Katarina held her wrist, dropping the knife to clatter to the floor. He held both of their gazes while he looked back and forth at each. Finally, his face seemed to soften again as he looked at Katarina.
"Katya, our only thought is to give you a chance at a better life. Tomorrow, I must come before the court of the Hanan. I do not know what tomorrow will hold, but according to the laws of this city, he has every right to throw me into the dungeons, because until you are of majority, or married, I am responsible for all that you do."
He sighed, his large shoulders bending under some great weight. "So while there is hope, we will look for a husband for you, because if I am thrown into the prisons, they will take this home and my shop, and you and your mother will be destitute. Your only choice then would be to return to the peoples of the Belhoun, and as terrible as you seem to think this life is here, it is a hundred times harder in the salt deserts."
He vaguely pointed towards some area of the house. "Go to your room. I must speak to your mother, and I would do so without you playing with the knives."
Katarina ran from the room, more than willing to hide from her father's wrecked pride, her mother's betrayed rage, and her guilt at the terrible fate she had brought down upon her own family because she couldn't control her anger for just one second.
She lay on her soft pallet, crying and sobbing at the storm of emotions crashing against her heart, just wishing to hide away from it all, to just be a phantom of tales, that couldn't be hurt by anything. She just wanted it all to go away...
Katarina jumped when she dropped the wooden yet again. Luckily, it landed in such a way that it clattered but did not break. Since waking up more exhausted than refreshed from her ragged nightmares, she seemed so clumsy. This was the third or fourth time something had slipped through her fingers when she was sure she had a grip on it.
Her father was in the shop, still preparing an order as if his fate was not to be decided later today. Her mother had short, clipped words for her, and the tension was unbearable in the house until Saleema left for the market on some pretense.
She had dusted and swept and wiped at the remnants of the dust storm that had plagued the city, desperate to keep her hands busy so her mind could simply be occupied. But no amount of work seemed to help, the fragments of her dream still haunting her with half-remembered images and emotions.
She could hear her father in the shop in the front, but each time she wanted to approach the thin curtain to talk to him as she had so many times before, on this morning the quiet seemed an unbreachable gulf. She stood for a long few minutes at the doorway, the shadow of his bulk moving across the light behind the curtain, when she heard a high voice in the shop. She heard her father's voice quietly respond when she recognized the voice. It was Goli, her best friend and confidant.
Goli was a year younger than Katarina and was dressed against the slight winds this morning with a heavier brown robe and head wrap, and a gauzy veil covering her nose and mouth that left her kohl-lined eyes, wide and round and brown, uncovered. She was pleasantly plump, and she wore her robes a bit too tight against her ever-growing curves.
She undid her veil with a smile, and she came forward to kiss Katarina on her cheeks when she stopped. "What is it bashe?" Kitty was her nickname for her friend. "You look as if someone has died? What is it?" she asked, concern in her eyes. The familiar kindness of her closest friend broke through a damn she didn't was there. Hot tears once more flowed as she sat hard, great anguish sobs wracking her body. Her voice hitched as she tried to explain. The Hanan and the beggar girl, her mother's fearful anger, her mother looking to marry her off. Goli took her by the hands, and with a look back over her shoulders towards Katarina's father's workshop, she led her out to the small back courtyard, the sky a faint, dirty brown from the remains of the sand winds.
Her friend unwrapped the gauzy veil from her face and dabbed at Katarina's eyes, shaking her head. "What is this stupid thing that makes you weep so?" She stood back, placing one hand on her round hip. "And I hope your tears are not from the idea of marriage? My mother has several offers of marriage for me, and one of their fathers is an anjandee trader."
Those who received a royal commission to trade in foreign lands across the waters of the Zahirahn Empire were often rich and powerful, as the silks spices, and other trade goods of the lands of the Golden Caliphate and his kingdoms were prized in so many of those backwater lands. Backwater lands like her father was from, she chided herself.
Goli continued. "You are beautiful, regardless of what those kafit stall girls say," she spat at the smooth, swept stones of the courtyard, making even that foul habit seem dainty. There were more than a few girls that Katarina had to deal with in the market who treated her with disdain for her mixed blood. "I am sure that your mother will only find the best husband for you, and if not," her eyes lit up, "if one of my suitors has a brother, he shall marry you, and we can be sisters!" She seemed caught up with this idea, smiling, trying to make Katarina feel better.
Though a glimmer of joy would have danced in her heart at the thought of Goli finding happiness in the arms of a wealthy suitor, Katarina struggled to muster a smile. The weight of her own emotions and the bleak future she saw ahead overshadowed the warmth she wanted to convey.
A stifled sob welled up within her once more, and she fought tenaciously to regain control over her tears. Her attempts to quell the waves of sorrow seemed futile, yet this time, she managed to raise her gaze to meet Goli's through eyes blurred with tears. She whispered, her voice a fragile thread, barely audible above a whisper, "I watch that fat judge brutally beating that beggar. . All for some coin. He struck her again and again..." Her voice drifted off as she simply ran out of words.
Katarina took in a steadying breath. "What...what if I go to him? The judge? If he takes out his anger on me, would he leave my parents alone?"
"Do you know how foolish that was?" Goli hissed quietly. " Only those who swore obeisance to Al Mazhir and the scriptures of the Avejah could be Hannan, the supposedly wise judges. Which meant he would take you for a wife, and when he wasn't taking out his anger on you between your legs, one of his many fat wives would make you work so hard you would be less than a slave."
She clucked her tongue, looked back towards the kitchen, and the front of the house, lowering her voice to a hiss. "What did you think your father would do then, hm? I didn't think your father Gregor would stand by and allow such a fate without a fight, and while your father was a big man, the Javindar would strike him down. Did you want such a fate for your father?" Katarin looked once again at the thin curtain, the shadows beyond tearing at her heart. Anger for being so helpless, and fear of what might happen to her family. She looked back at her friend. "So what should I have done, Goli? How could I have made amends? There was no one to plead to above the Hanan, and if there were, who would have believed me?" Goli shook her head sadly. "I did not know, basche," she said. "All I knew was with a Hanan, there were good ones, and there were bad ones. Perhaps if you had thrown yourself on the mercy of another Hanan? Asked him to judge your actions?" She said the last as a question.
But at that moment, Katarina did not trust any Hanan. She saw them all as the same; bribe-taking thieves who used what little power they had to further themselves, and gods damned the rest of them.
She walked back into the kitchen, stood outside the muslin curtain. She yelled at her father to stop punishing her, and she heard him stop working, and even from where she stood, she heard his sigh. His shadow approached the curtain, and he lifted it to one side, looked down at her with great sadness. He was about to speak, when the distant sound of a ram's horn signaled the morning call to judgment when all who would lay their troubles before the Hanans were bid to do so.
Gregor looked troubled as he looked down at Katarina. "I must go. I am to see this Hanan at the call, and he will pass judgment." He reached out a heavy hand to place on her shoulder. "Katya," he said, his voice quiet.
That simple touch burst a dam inside her, and she wailed as she rushed in to cling to him, tears ran fresh. "NO! Do not go! No father! I will beg for mercy! Please!" He gave her a firm, long hug, kissed her head. Finally, he pushed her back. She could barely see him through the tears.
"You will do no such thing. I am responsible, and no one will ever harm a single hair on your sweet head without feeling my wrath. Stay here, your mother will return shortly. If the gods willed it, perhaps it would be just a heavy fine, and we would begin anew. I loved you, my Katya."
She clung to his outer robe as he turned to leave, Goli came beside her, held her shoulders as she fell to her knees, the rush of guilt and sadness brought her to her knees as she screamed at the ground at the unfairness of it all as her father left the shop. Goli rubbed her back, making quiet, shushing sounds.
Katarina wasn't sure how long she was like that, her face felt swollen and hot from crying, but then she heard her mother's voice, and she was suddenly in her arms, the smell of jasmine about her, as her mother rocked her, her voice thick with tears. They stood like that for a long time, but there was a building resignation within her. Her father had said he was responsible. That he would take the blame. That was unfair. It was all unfair. She had the sudden urgency to let all within the Hanan's judgment chamber know just what a scoundrel he had been. She would save her father, she would be brave.
She knew if she tried to explain to her mother, she would keep her here in the shop, hiding until Gregor returned or he did not. But that was not good enough. She took in a deep breath...
Katarina found herself outside their shop, moving quickly. She must have surprised her mother, as she didn't recall slipping out of her grasp nor opening and closing the heavy wood door to the front of her father's shop. There was so much going on in her head that she must have simply blanked it out as unimportant, but now here she was, running through the now-crowded streets of the city towards where that particular Hanan held court near the Bezir fountain.
She was filled with determination, her eyes red from crying, tears and mucus on her face. She was going to save her father. How... she just wasn't sure yet. Navigating through a maze of people, some of whom hurled accusations or surprise as she dashed by, Katarina vaguely registered a couple of men warning others about the "pocket stealer."
Despite the affront, she had no room in her thoughts for indignation, her entire focus fixed on racing forward, regretting her choice of footwear for that impromptu sprint compared to the sturdy shoes she wore at the shop. Even as her legs began to protest from the swift maneuvers and her breath grew heavier, a persistent fragment of her mind questioned how she had managed to extricate herself from her mother's grasp and bypass the formidable front door. The image of the cumbersome crossbar and the door's tendency to stick after damp nights flickered in her mind.
Swiftly dismissing these considerations as trivial, she pushed forward relentlessly. Knew she was drawing near to where the judge would hold the morning court on his plush cushions. As the fountain came into view, she slowed, her eyes scanning for the location where the judge would be. Quietly circumventing the fountain, she sought the distinct banner indicating the presence of this particular judge. She vowed not to allow her father to be wrested away from her. She was determined to uncover something, anything, that could be used to coerce the judge into sparing her family.
Meanwhile, another facet of her mind insisted on reminding her of the harm she'd already brought upon her family. Pushing these intrusive thoughts away, she clung to her conviction that she would uncover a solution, by whatever means necessary. Amid her determination, she offered a silent prayer to the foreign god of her father, imploring him for guidance and assistance.
She wiped at her face, the sleeves of her robe dark with her tears and running nose. She could see the crowd of those who wished for judgment or were called to judgment near the north side of the fountain.
As she suspected, the Hanan for this quarter of merchants and stall workers was seated on a wooden platform comforted by large cushions that the large, muscled Javindar around him had to move each day.
There was a crowd and a line of supplicants, the Javindar watching over everyone with their beards and white-turbaned heads, open black vests and white pantaloon pants, spears at hand, and curved shamshir at their hips.
The crowd of people was subdued, but muttering amongst themselves, and when the Hanan gave his pronouncement of whatever he was judging, all said as one as he finished, one hand indolently raised, "All blessings to Al-Mazhir!" Even if many of those did not follow the teachings of the Avejah, all understood to at least show public obeisance to the ruling religion of the land.
The Hanan was dressed in robes of purest white, the golden sash of his station coming from his left shoulder to right hip, a chain of silver about his waist, and a small, delicate curved dagger at his fat hip. He was seated with his legs crossed, a slave shading him with a stretch of dyed muslin he held up by a long pole. The slave wore the traditional collar, this one of bronze, showing him to be a long-time and loyal slave, instead of the iron that many lowly worker slaves wore.
Katarina oddly recalled many drawn-out arguments in which her mother had wanted to buy a slave girl to work around the home, while her father, oddly, was vehemently opposed to it. He had normally given in so easily to her mother on almost all things, but this, he was adamant on. She wasn't sure why, as even her friend Goli's family had a slave girl who cooked and cleaned for them for years.
She forgot that thread of recollection as she saw someone step closer to the Hanan and speak into his ear. By his blue turban, he must be a servant, most likely a clerk, as he held many scrolls under his arm. The Hanan nodded, several chins wobbling as he looked out to the crowd.
"Gregor the Silversmith. Come forward to be judged."
That was when she caught sight of her father, stepping forward from the crowd. He held his head high as he came to stand before the Hanan in the wide open space that the crowd made. Katarina was desperate to push her way through, the people crowding her as she lost sight of her father. There was general murmuring and those around her cursed her and pushed her back as she struggled to move forward. She needed to get to where her father was, then she almost stumbled as she must have slid past several people and into the open behind her father.
"Your daughter attacked the august body of a judge of Al Mazhir. She defiled one of his blessed servants with this attack. As the father of an unmarried girl, you were solely responsible for this act of wanton disrespect and civil disobedience." He paused as he looked over her father, not seeing Katarina who was hidden by his bulk.
He kept his head up as he looked back to the Hanan. "My daughter was willful, that was true, but any actions she had taken, only I could be to blame for failing to teach her more respect. I submitted to the will and laws of the Caliph and his blessed judges," he said as if one long born in Zahirah. It disgusted her that these people and their laws, laws she and her family had lived by and abided by her whole life, would punish her father.
From the crowd, Katarina moved forward, finally standing just behind her father, until she moved next to him, out of arm's reach. She would not have him push her away when she was trying to save his life. Her father did not notice her until she was next to him, and Hanan stopped his next words to smile with clear maliciousness. "It is apparent that you have no control over your household, silversmith."
At this, Gregor frowned, but turned to see Katarina. His frown turned into a scowl as he hissed at her. "Katarina! What were you doing here, girl?" He turned his back to the Hanan as he walked to her.
The Hanan's voice was hard as he spoke next. "I would not have this blessed court dishonored by your daughter's blatant disrespect for this city, this blessed personage, and her father by this interruption."
Gregor turned, one arm back to push her behind him as one of the Janvindar guards turned to the other, passing off his spear as he pulled a whip from his side. It was a scorpion's tail; long, braided lengths of leather with a metal hook at the end of each of the several tails.
"You have claimed responsibility for your daughter's actions, and in doing so, you will pay her punishment." He held up his gold-leafed scepter of office. "For striking this august personage, you will be fined one thousand silver kasems," Gregor's shoulders fell, but he still looked resolute at the Hanan as the Javindar guard stood several feet away.
"But your daughter dared to enter the court of judgment without being summoned. The laws of the Holy Court of the Golden Emperor applied to all, and all understood to at least show public obeisance to the ruling religion of the land.
He lowered the scepter to point at Katarina. "She would suffer twenty lashes of the scorpion's tail."
"NO!" Gregor shouted as he put himself firmly between the Javindar guard, who glowered at the bigger man. Distantly, Katarina could hear her mother's voice somewhere at the edge of the crowd, calling desperately for her. Her father continued. "I am responsible! I will take all of her punishment!" And then her father did something Katarina would never have hoped to see. Her father fell to his knees.
"Mercy! I beg for mercy for my willful daughter. Her punishment will be long-lasting and fearful, but I only ask that I take any punishment! Please, your holiness! Please!"
At that moment, her mother pushed her way to the front of the crowd, her face mad with worry. She put her hand over her mouth, her color going pale. From here, Katarina could see her mother staring at the scene. What had started as the best of intentions, had instead turned into a horrible, horrible disaster. What had she done?
The Hanan sat for a long moment, while the Javindar guard uncoiled the whip. After a long moment of the fat Hanan looking at Katarina, she was stricken dumb at how quickly things had turned for the worse, he nodded, then spoke with that same, smug voice.
"Let it not be said that the holy judges who served the Emperor and the Caliph could not be merciful." He pointed his scepter at Gregor. "You would suffer her punishment." He gestured towards the Javindar guard. "Forty lashes."
With what looked like a bit too much enjoyment, the Javindar guard reached back to begin the lashes, as her father meekly fell forward, already on his knees, now his hands on the ground before him, his head bowed.
"NO!!" Katarina had had enough. Enough of this dung heap of a Hanan. Enough of the unfair laws, and enough of watching her father, so proud, so strong, be broken before her eyes. She rushed forward.
Gregor turned his head, his eyes wide. "Katya no!" He moved fast for a big man and was on his feet and threw his arms out to catch her.
This time, there was no mistaking what happened. His big arms passed through her as if she were air, her own body continuing forward to run through her father's body as he fell forward heavily, unbalanced by this unexpected event.
She stopped, her entire body tingling as if a thousand spiders had crawled across her skin at once. She stood stock still as she looked at her hands, not seeing the Javindar scowl and lash forward with his whip. She yelped and held up her arm to protect herself, but she felt nothing as the dangerous leather and metal whip passed harmlessly through her, as if she were an apparition.
The entire crowd went silent, all staring hard at her. The Hanan was slowly standing, the Javindar guards coming closer, their spears leveled at her. The Hanan pointed his scepter at her. "IFRIT! DEVIL!"
Katarina held her hands out, that maddening itch all over her body now, her head pounding. "N..no! I'm not ifrit! I am-" Someone in the crowd shouted a word. "Jinn-touched!" while others cried something she didn't register.
Then, things happened so quickly. She heard her father's movement behind her, coming closer. "Katya!" he called as she saw her father's arms come from behind her to try to embrace her. She also saw the spear of one of the Javindar guards thrust forward.
The wide, leaf-shaped blade pierced her chest. There was no pain, and the spear continued forward through to the shaft, the Javindar's eyes wide with shock. There was a grunt behind her, and the spear seemed to pull out of the guard's slack hands, the shaft moving up through her head as she blinked at the disorienting action. Then her mother's scream pierced the air.
"GREGOR!!"