Equal of the Sun A Novel - By Anita Amirrezvani Page 0,131

palace?”

“When you were a hotheaded young man, I feared you would try to take revenge on Isma‘il and get yourself killed.”

I cast my hand over my forehead. Had all of that been written there?

“And so I have.”

“And so you have. Little did you know how I prayed for the success of your mission. There is justice in the world, although it takes unpredictable paths.”

“May God be praised.”

“Your father’s murder is one of the reasons that Tahmasb Shah kept his son locked away at Qahqaheh. After that episode, the Shah was doubly certain that he couldn’t trust him.”

“Now I understand why you looked after me so well. But why did the Shah take me in to begin with?”

“He decided to make it up to you.”

“You mean I didn’t have to get myself cut?”

Balamani grimaced, and I was pierced by a sensation as extreme as the one that had followed the removal of my parts. I had to clap my arms around myself to keep from crying out.

“I don’t know. The Shah paid attention to your plight only after you requested an audience. That is when he told Anwar to investigate the matter, and Anwar reported his belief that your father had been falsely fingered by people who wished to bring him down because of the favor he enjoyed. When the Shah discovered that you became a eunuch out of a desire to serve him, he was doubly moved by your story.”

“If the Shah thought my father was innocent, why didn’t he admit the mistake and give restitution to my family?”

Balamani laughed ruefully. “How often does a leader admit someone has been killed in error? Besides, he wasn’t the one who ordered the killing.”

“How strange my fate has been!”

“One of the strangest. That is why I wished to help, as did others, like Tahmasb Shah. He thought highly of you.”

“How do you know?”

“I heard him tell Pari that your intelligence and loyalty made you one of the jewels of the court. He made her promise to treat you well.”

Balamani sighed deeply, creating ripples in the bathwater. “I wish I could have told you all of this sooner. You are like the nephew I never had. I hated to have to withhold the truth from you for so long.”

I looked at Balamani’s thick, knotted fingers and thought about how those very hands had carried the order for my father’s death. Yet the same hands had also massaged my temples when I was ill with a fever and had intervened for me whenever I needed help. Blaming him would be like attacking a messenger who happened to bring bad news.

“Balamani, I owe you nothing but thanks,” I said in a congested voice. “How can I ever repay you for so many years of kindness, oh wise, fearless, and loving friend! You have taught me what it means to be a complete man.”

Tears sprang to Balamani’s eyes. He rinsed his face with the bathwater, his broad shoulders shaking. How lucky I had been that God had sent me to him!

The heat of the bath was making my head swim; the steam in the room obscured my vision. I felt as if I couldn’t breathe. Easing my legs out of the tub, I called to the bath attendant to bring my clothes and handed him a generous tip.

“Javaher, are you all right?” Balamani asked.

“I need air.”

As I left the hammam, I felt a strong urge to visit my father’s grave. I hadn’t been there in years, and now the things I had learned made my spirit long to commune with his.

I passed through the Ali Qapu gate and turned down the Promenade of the Royal Stallions toward my old family home, remembering the day my father’s body had arrived wrapped in a bloody cotton sheet. I didn’t know who lived in the house now and didn’t want to know. After leaving the Friday mosque behind me, I arrived at the cemetery at the southern outskirts of town where my father was buried. At the entrance, I bought rose water from a peddler and went in search of my father. The cemetery had grown since the last time I had visited, and it took me time to find the granite slab marking his grave.

I called one of the graveside attendants to sweep away the dirt and wash the slab with buckets of water. While he did his work, I heard the cry of birds above me. I looked up and saw a flock of white geese that