Fatima appeared in my class two days later. She wore white stockings and a short, lace-trimmed blue dress littered with white daisies. Fragile and wispy, she walked over to Nabeel, who was sitting next to me. “I want to sit here.” Nabeel shrugged, and moved from the seat he had occupied for weeks. She sat down, kept her head lowered, but looked up at me with her brown eyes, appearing both nervous and confident. “You have to be my friend,” she said.
The crystal palace lay atop the second mountain peak. Its size, architecture, and translucence dazzled the eyes. Everything inside — stairs, columns, balustrades; tables, chairs, bookshelves — was made of clear crystal without any obvious imperfection. Sunlight refracted within the great hall, producing shards of fiery color. It was eerily quiet, devoid of life. “I could live here,” said Jacob. “I would want to redecorate a bit, but the lighting is stupendous.”
“It is too sterile,” huffed Isaac. He jumped on one of the lounges, dropped his loincloth, and peed. “You cannot stain the furniture. I could not live here.”
“We might have to,” said Fatima. “The door just closed by itself.”
The eight little demons scampered about the hall in every direction. Ishmael tried the door, which was locked and bolted tight. Ezra and Elijah checked the windows.
“The trials are getting more difficult,” said Job. “I hate that.”
“Cumbersome,” said Isaac, “but not difficult.” He hiccupped, burped, and regurgitated a seed out of his mouth. “Sweet,” he said. “Sister, allow me to have one of the remaining bags.”
“Pick,” said Fatima.
“This one,” Isaac said. “It smells of rich earth.” He spilled the mud onto a spot in the center of the hall and planted the seed. “Watch,” he said. He stood back and admired his handiwork. “Grow,” he commanded, and the ivy crept gradually. Each small vine sprouted another and another.
“Poison ivy?” asked Fatima.
“A variant,” replied Isaac. “Worry not. You are one of us. Poisons are your lifeblood.”
The ivy twined around ankles, covered the floor, and began to ascend the walls. Greenish flowers erupted on the branches as the ivy snaked its way to the ceiling.
“Dull flowers, though,” said Ishmael. He threw morning glories upon the ivy.
“My damned turn,” announced Adam. He changed the floor cover into ground ivy with blue-purple flowers. Noah threw in hyacinth beans. Ezra added cypress vines.
“Xanthous,” said Jacob, and a canary-bird vine flowered in yellow effulgence.
“Xanthous?” snapped Isaac. “Do you make these things up?”
“Let him be,” said Ishmael. “He is a little different, harmlessly so.”
“Sweet,” commanded Elijah, and sweet peas burst forth. “Oh my. I meant jasmine.”
“Stop it,” said Isaac. “If you are going to do this, do it right.” Deep-red bougainvillea covered walls, floor, and ceiling. “I could live here now.” He stepped gingerly across the vine until he reached the door, which was entirely covered. He pushed through the ivy, and the door tumbled and crumbled. “Hurry,” he said. “The palace will not remain erect much longer.”
“The word ‘maqâm’ means ‘place’ or ‘situation,’ ” Istez Camil said. “It also means ‘shrine.’ In music, it’s about scale, but also mood. Do you know what that is?”
“No.” My fingers mechanically ascended and descended the oud’s neck. I had been doing scales for forty-five minutes.
“Each maqâm is related to a specific mood through its structure and modality. When you play a maqâm, the technique should become invisible, so that all that remains is pure emotion. The intent is to induce a certain mood in the listener and yourself. The intended mood will determine what maqâm and what kind of improvisation you will play. For example, if you want to induce a sad mood, you can pick one that’s very microtonal, like Maqâm Saba.”
He nodded, hoping to elicit some form of acknowledgment. I shook my head. Istez Camil stood up, was about to say something, but stopped. He lit a cigarette. “You’re tired,” he said. “We’ll finish this next time.”
I put down my instrument, stretched my fingers. “Why do people think you’re dead?”
“Dead? Maybe because I’ve stopped playing publicly.” Istez Camil looked out the window, his back to me.
“Why did you stop?”
“I played the wrong note,” he said. “I played the wrong mood.” I didn’t say anything, waited for my teacher to elaborate. “My wife had died. I bored my audience. There was only one maqâm I could bear to hear — or play. The audience couldn’t hear the variations of the maqâm I was playing. They grew weary of hearing the same maqâm over and over.”
“Maqâm Saba,” I said. “I love how slowly it moves, how infinitely tender, like teardrops descending along cheeks, a cascade of grace.”
“See? You do understand.” Istez Camil wouldn’t turn around. “A cascade of grace. That’s so wonderful. It describes all the great oud playing from Shah-Kuli or even earlier. It is said that he was the greatest musician that ever lived.”
“Tell me.”
“When the Turks defeated the Persians and reconquered Baghdad in 1638, eight hundred janissaries were killed in an ambush, so the Turks launched a general massacre. They cut the heads of thirty thousand Persians, but the sultan still needed his entertainment. A Persian musician, scheduled to be executed, was brought to the diwan. As his countrymen, friends, and family were being decapitated one by one, the great Shah-Kuli played a maqâm for the pitiless Sultan Murat. He sang so sweetly, played the oud so gently, ended his performance with a dirge that brought every listener to tears.” He turned away from the window, smiled at me. “The listeners’ teardrops descended along the cheeks to the beat of the maqâm. A cascade of grace. And the weeping sultan commanded a halt to the killings.”
There was no palace behind the third mountain peak. The company flew from top to bottom and back, scanned every nook in the steep landscape, but found nothing.
Elijah unleashed the crows. “With thine eyes,” he said, “find.”
Jacob unleashed the bats. “With thine ears,” he said, “find.”
“Could it be inside the mountain?” Adam asked. “I can send the scorpions.”
“Could it be farther ahead?” asked Noah.
“Wait,” ordered Fatima.
Bats and crows scudded over the land. Fatima followed as many as she could with her eyes. “Higher,” she said. “He must be higher.” She unhooked a black ribbon from her hair and held it at arm’s length. She raised it high above her head. A group of seven crows followed her direction and flew above the mountain peak. She jerked her ribbon once more, and the crows flew higher still. Higher, and the crows would reach the clouds. Before she could jerk her ribbon again, one of the crows folded its wings and dropped. Elijah sent its siblings to break its fall and return it to him. The indigo imp held the suffering crow in his hands. “The bird speaks.”
“Call the crows and bats back,” Fatima announced. “I know where King Kade is.”
“Where?” Ishmael asked. Elijah and Fatima both replied, “He is in the clouds.”
The first Thursday of December found Uncle Jihad and me in a small café in Msaitbeh. We’d gotten permission from my parents, since it was a school night. The whitewash was peeling off the walls, which were unadorned, not one picture or painting. We sat at a Formica table that was too high for me. Uncle Jihad greeted all the men, although it was quite apparent that he didn’t fit in this environment. He was by far the most colorful thing to have walked through the doors. There were no women. Not one chin on any man in the full café had seen a razor in at least twenty-four hours, whereas Uncle Jihad’s hairless face and head shone a warm blue from the reflected fluorescents.