It takes only two more hard chops for Sajaa to sever Ajmal’s head from his shoulders.
And then, yet another murder committed, she sinks to the ground on her back and lays there spread-eagled for a long while, staring up into dawn’s sky. Hot tears spill down the sides of her face.
O Allah, what have I become?!
‘If she be a
true Muslim’, so preached the Mullah to Sajaa long ago when she had sought his counsel after misbehaving as a child, ‘A woman can still be admitted to
Paradise if she can find a way to atone for her sins.’ But Sajaa knows, to survive the perils that lie ahead of her, she is going to have to commit many more sins in the future and it will be next to impossible to atone for them all. And, too, she is beginning to seriously doubt if she is a ‘true’ Muslim, at all. True Muslims are
good daughters --
good sisters --
good wives --
good people.
I am none of these things. She thinks, bitterly.
Slowly the sun begins to rise above the eastern horizon warming the chill from the air. A shadow passes across her face, and Sajaa opens her eyes to see a pair of buzzards circling above her. It occurs to her she has dozed. With a groan, she climbs stiffly to her feet and brushes the dust off her robes. She takes up the sword and limps back to the camp. She rummages through the dead men’s belongings and finds food and tears into it ravenously. She finds coin and camping supplies and tucks them away into the saddlebags.
The sun is well above the horizon by the time she climbs up into the saddle of the black mare, the bay gelding in tandem behind her.
With gentle words and a soft nudge, she gets the horses moving slowly north toward the ribbon of gold that is the Makarem. Beyond it lies Megalos, the land of the heathens…
Al Nihaya
This message was last edited by the player at 16:52, Mon 02 Aug 2021.