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Chapter 14 - The Fourteenth Night

The morning now dawned and Scheherazade stopped talking. After a large day, the fourteenth night arrived. She continued speaking:

"I have heard that the second dervish continued his tale…"

"Oh auspicious king!"

Continuation of the story of the thirteenth night…

The princess took in her hand a knife inscribed with Hebrew characters and with this she cut a circle in the middle of the palace. Over this she wrote names, talismans and spells, and she recited words, some intelligible and some unintelligible. After a time, everything grew dark and the efrit came down on us in his own shape. His arms were like winnowing forks, his legs like the masts of ships and his eyes like firebrands. We shrank from him in fear, and the princess said:

"You are not welcome!"

At which he turned into a lion.

She expressed:

"Treacherous!"

"You have broken the covenant and the oath."

"Did we not swear that neither of us would oppose the other?"

"You cursed efrit."

"Am I bound to one like you?"

The efrit said:

"Take what comes to you."

And in his lion shape, he opened its mouth and sprang at the girl. She quickly took one of her hairs, shook it in her hand and muttered a spell, so that the hair became a sharp sword. With this, she struck a blow at the lion which cut it in two, but its head turned into a scorpion. For her part, the princess turned into a huge snake, which attacked the damned efrit in his scorpion form. There was a fierce fight, and the scorpion turned into an eagle while the snake became a vulture. For some time the vulture pursued the eagle until it turned into a black cat. The princess then became a brindled wolf and for a time the two creatures fought together in the palace.

Then, the cat, finding itself beaten, became a large red pomegranate in the middle of the palace fountain. When the wolf came up to it, it rose in the air and fell on the palace floor where it burst, its seeds scattered, each in a different place, until they covered the floor. A shiver ran through the wolf and it became a cock, which started to pick the seeds so as not to leave a single one, but, as was fated, one of them was hidden by the side of the fountain.

The cock then started to crow and to flap its wings, gesturing to us with its beak. We could not understand what it meant and it crowed so loudly that we thought that the palace had fallen in on us. Then, it went all around the floor until it saw the grain concealed beside the fountain.

It pounced on this to peck it up, but the grain slipped into the middle of the water in the fountain and became a fish which dived down to the bottom. The cock turned into a bigger fish and went down after it. This second fish vanished from sight for some time and then suddenly we heard a loud cry and a scream, which made us shudder. Then out came the efrit like a firebrand, with fire coming from his open mouth and fire and smoke from his eyes and nose.

He was followed by the princess in the form of a huge burning coal and the two fought for a time until both were covered by thick flames and the palace was choked with smoke.

We were terrified and were about to plunge into the water, fearing we might be burned to death.

The king recited the formula:

"There is no might and no power except with Allah, the Exalted, the Omnipotent. We belong to Allah and to Him do we return."

He added:

"I wish that I had not forced her to do this in order to rescue this ape, placing so huge a burden on her to confront this damned efrit, who cannot be matched by all the efrits to be found in the world. I wish that I had never known this ape. I had wanted to do him a favor and to free him from his spell, but my heart has been weighed down by misfortune."

Meanwhile, I myself, lady, was tongue-tied and could not say anything to him. Then, before we knew what was happening, there was a shout from beneath the flames and the efrit was there in the hall with us, blowing fire into our faces. The princess caught up with him and blew back fire at him, while we were struck by sparks from both of them. Her sparks did us no harm, but one of these caught me in the eye while I was still in my ape form and blinded it. Another spark struck the king's face, half of which it burned, together with his beard and lower jaw, while all his lower teeth fell out. Yet another fell on the chest of the eunuch and he was immediately burned to death.

We were sure that we were about to die, but in the midst of our despair we heard a voice extolling Allah and adding:

"He has given victory and aid and has confounded those who disbelieve in the religion of Muhammad, the radiant moon."

This voice belonged to none other than the princess, who had burnt the efrit, reducing him to a pile of ashes.

She came up to us and said:

"Bring me a cup of water."

When this had been fetched, she spoke some incomprehensible words over it, sprinkled me with the water and said:

"I conjure you by the Truth, return freely to your original shape."

A shudder ran through me and suddenly I had gone back to being a man, although I had lost one eye.

The princess cried out:

"The fire, father, the fire! I have not much longer to live. I have not been used to fighting with a jinni, although, had he been human, I would have killed him long ago. I was not in difficulty until the pomegranate burst and I picked up the seeds, but I forgot the one which contained the efrit's life. Had I picked it up in time, he would have died instantly, but I did not know what fate had ordained. Then he came back and we fought a hard battle under the earth, in the sky and in the water. Every time I tried a spell, he would reply with another, until he tried the spell of fire, and there are few who escape when this is used against them. Then destiny came to my aid and I burned him up before he could burn me, after I had summoned him to accept the religion of Islam. But now I am a dead woman, may Allah recompense you for my loss."

Then she cried for help against the fire and went on crying as a black spark leapt up to her breast and from there to her face. When it got there, she wept and recited:

"I bear witness that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is the Prophet of God."

We looked at her and all of a sudden she had become a pile of ashes lying beside those of the efrit. We grieved for her and I wished that I could have taken the place of my benefactress rather than see her beautiful face reduced to ashes, but God's decrees are not to be revoked.

On seeing what had happened to his daughter, the king plucked out what was left of his beard, struck his face and tore his clothes, as did I, and we both wept for her. The chamberlains and officers of state arrived to find the two piles of ashes and the king lying unconscious. For a time, they stood around him in amazement and when he recovered and told what had happened to the princess in her encounter with the efrit, they were filled with distress and the women and the slave girls all screamed.

After seven days of mourning, the king gave orders for a huge dome to be built over his daughter's ashes, which was lit with candles and lamps, while the efrit's ashes were scattered in the air, subject to God's wrath. The king then fell ill and was at the point of death, but he recovered after a month and his beard grew again. He sent for me and said:

"Young man, I passed my days living at ease, protected from the calamities of time, until you came here. How I wish that I had never set eyes on you or your ugly face, for it is you who have brought me to ruin. Firstly, I have lost my daughter, who was worth a hundred men. It was you whom my daughter rescued at the cost of her own life. Secondly, I was injured by fire; I lost my teeth, and my servant died. I recognize that none of this was your fault: all that happened to you and to me came from God, to Whom be praise. But now, my son, leave my land, for you have caused enough suffering, as was fated for me and for you. Go in peace, but if you come back and I see you again, I shall kill you."

He shouted at me and I left his presence, scarcely believing that I had escaped and without knowing where to go. I thought over what had happened to me, how I had been abandoned on my journey, how I had escaped from my attackers, how I had walked for a month before entering the city as a stranger, how I had met the tailor and then the girl in the underground chamber, and how I had escaped from the efrit who had wanted to kill me. I relived all my emotions from the beginning to the end and I gave praise to Allah, saying:

"It has cost me my eye but not my life."

Before quitting the city, I went to the baths and shaved off my beard, after which I put on a black hair shirt and poured dust over my head. There is not a day on which I do not weep, thinking of the disasters that have struck me and of the loss of my eye. Every time, I think of this, I shed tears and recite these lines:

"By Allah, the Merciful, surely my affair bewilders me.

I do not know the source of sorrows that have surrounded me.

I shall endure until endurance itself cannot match mine.

Continuing until Allah closes my affairs.

I may be conquered, but I shall not show pain.

As a thirsty man endures in a hot valley.

I shall endure until endurance itself learns.

I can endure what is more bitter than aloes.

Itself the bitterest of all.

But bitterer than all this would be for patience to betray me.

The secrets of my secret heart are its interpreter.

At the heart of the secret is my heart's secret love for you.

Were mountains to feel my sorrow, they would be crushed.

Fire would be quenched and winds would cease to blow.

Whoever claims that Time holds sweetness.

Must sometime meet a day more bitter than aloes.

After that, I wandered through the world visiting cities and making for Baghdad, the House of Peace, in the hope of reaching the Commander of the Faithful and telling him what had happened to me. I arrived at the city tonight and there I found this first companion of mine standing in perplexity. I greeted him and talked to him and then our third companion arrived, greeted us and told us that he was a stranger.

The two of us said:

"So we are we and we have only just come on this blessed night."

"The three of us then walked together without knowing each other's stories until fate brought us to this door and we came into your presence. This, then, is the reason why my beard and moustache have been shaven and my eye gouged out."

The lady of the house said:

"Yours is a strange story!"

"You can touch your forelock and go on your way."

He replied:

"Not before I have heard the stories of my companion", at which the third dervish stepper forward and started telling his tale.

Story of the third dervish

Great lady, my tale is not like theirs but is more wonderful and more marvelous, and it explains the reason for the shaving of my beard and the plucking out of my eye. They both were victims of fate, but I brought this fate upon myself, burdening my own soul with sorrow. I was a king and the son of a king. After my father's death, I succeeded to the throne, ruled justly and treated my subjects well. I was fond of sailing and my city lay on the shore of a broad sea, in the middle of which many large islands were scattered, and I had fifty merchant ships, fifty smaller pleasure boats and a hundred and fifty warships. It so happened, that I decided to go on a pleasure trip to the islands and I set out with ten ships, taking provisions for a whole month. We had been sailing for twenty days when, one night, cross winds blew against us and the sea became very rough, with tumultuous waves, and we were plunged into thick darkness. Despairing of life, I said:

"A man who courts danger is not to be praised, even if he comes out safely."

We called on Almighty Allah and implored His help, but the wind continued to shift and the waves to clash together until daybreak. The wind then dropped; the sea became calm and the sun came out. Looking out, we found ourselves by an island and so we landed on the shore, cooked and ate a meal and rested for two days. We sailed on for another twenty days, when the currents turned against us and, as the captain of my ship did not recognize where we were, we told the lookout to climb to the crow's-nest to scan the sea. He went up the mast and shouted to the captain that to the right he could see fish on the surface, while at some distance away there was a dark shape, showing sometimes as black and sometimes as white.

When the captain heard this, he dashed his turban on the deck, tore out hairs from his beard and said:

"Good news! We are all dead men; not one of us can escape."

He started to cry, and we all joined in, weeping for ourselves. I asked the captain what it was that the lookout had seen. He said:

"Master, we went off course on the day of the gale when the wind did not die down until the following morning. That meant that we were off course for two days, and since that night we have been astray for eleven days, with no wind to blow us back on course. Tomorrow evening, we shall come to an island of black stone that is called the Magnetic Mountain. The currents will force us under its lee and the ship will split apart, nails being drawn out to attach themselves to the rock. This is because Allah Almighty has set in it a secret power that attracts everything made of iron and Allah only knows how much of the metal is there, thanks to the many ships that have been wrecked on the rock over the course of time. By the shore there is a vaulted dome of brass set on ten columns and on top of this is a rider and his horse, both made of brass. In his hand the rider carries a brass lance and to his breast is fixed a lead tablet inscribed with names and talismans. It is this rider, Oh king."

He went on:

"Who kills everyone who comes his way, and there is no escape unless the rider falls from his horse."

At that, my lady, the captain wept bitterly and we were convinced that we were doomed. Each of us said farewell to his comrades and left his final instructions in case one should escape. We had no sleep that night and when morning came, we found ourselves close to the mountain. Then, the force of the currents took us and when our ships were under the cliffs, they split apart, the nails and every iron object aboard being drawn towards the magnetic rock, to which they stuck. By the end of the day, we were drifting in the water around the mountain, and although some of us still lived, most were drowned, while the survivors could scarcely recognize each other, stunned as they were by the force of the waves and the gusts of wind. As for me, Almighty Allah preserved my life as it was His intention to distress, torture and afflict me further. I clung to a plank that was driven by the wind until was blown ashore. There I found a beaten track, like a staircase carved in the mountain, leading to the summit. I pronounced the Name of Almighty God…

To be continued during the fifteenth night…