Equal of the Sun A Novel - By Anita Amirrezvani Page 0,79
wails. No one ever told me what happened, but now I suspect that my mother died in childbirth. Today I had the eerie feeling that I was one of the attendants at her deathbed. I feel sometimes as if all the moments of my life existed simultaneously—as if I am living in the past and present at the same time.”
“May God keep the souls of your family in His gentle embrace.”
He sighed. “You are lucky to have a sister. In memory of my lost sibling, I shall give double my usual amount to the orphans of Qazveen. And now, tell me your news. Why are you awake so early?”
I sat up. “Balamani, I have finally learned the name of my father’s killer. It was Kamiyar Kofrani!” I blurted out.
“You mean the accountant? How do you know?” He didn’t sound as surprised as I thought he would be.
“Mirza Salman told me.”
“Are you sure he is the right man?”
“Do you think Mirza Salman would lie?”
“Any man can lie.”
I thought his answer very strange. “What about this Kofrani—was he a good servant?”
“Yes. One of the best.”
I did not like the sound of that.
“And his children?”
“He had three boys. One of them is dead, but I am fairly certain the other two serve the government in Shiraz, and have wives and children.”
“Which I will never have. I hope they all burn in hell.” I stared at him suspiciously. “How do you come by so much information about them?”
“Javaher, you know that I know almost every family who has served at court for the last fifty years.”
I lifted the blanket off my bedroll with so much force that it flew onto the floor.
Balamani shrugged off the rest of his clothes and got into his bed. “My friend, I can understand why you are angry. But since the man is dead, what can you do?”
I glared at him from my bedroll. “That is good advice—unless your father has been murdered, in which case something must be done.”
“Remember that I lost my father all the same. Or rather, he lost me to a slaver. But I haven’t been spending my time trying to track down the merchant who chopped off my eight-year-old penis and sold me to court.”
“Wasn’t it wrong?”
He snorted. “If it wasn’t, Muslims would castrate their own boys instead of buying gelded Hindus and Christians.”
“Aren’t you angry?”
“It is not that simple. If I hadn’t lost my keer, I would never have feasted on kabob, lived in a palace, or worn silk. My family was as poor as dirt.”
“Balamani, stop equivocating.”
Compassion softened his eyes. “My young friend, it is not just your father’s murderer you have to forgive.”
“Who is it then?”
“Yourself.”
“For what?”
“For what you did.”
Rage surged through me. “All this time, I thought you wanted to help me!”
“Of course I do,” he replied, but for the first time I could remember, he sounded as if he didn’t really mean it. I maintained an angry silence. Balamani rolled over and began snoring before I could think of what to say next.
A group of Sufis met on Thursdays to whirl their way closer to God. From time to time, I attended their sama to imbibe the peacefulness of the ceremony. After hearing the news about my father, I decided to avoid the usual Thursday-evening leisure activities, which I had no stomach for, and go to the sama. I sent a message to Pari that I was ill and left the palace through a side gate.
The Sufis gathered in a large building with windows high in the walls and roof, so that the room was dappled as if in the shade of a walnut tree. When I arrived late in the afternoon, the ceremony had already begun. The anguished notes of the flute called out the desire of the reed for reunion with its maker, throwing me deeper into memories of my father.
I took a place on a cushion and watched the Sufis whirl. They wore long white tunics belted at the waist, white trousers, and tall tan hats, while their spiritual leaders performed music to help guide their journey. The aspirants used one leg as a pivot, turning their bodies around it with surprising speed. To keep their balance and channel divine energy, they lifted one arm to the sky, palm up, and directed the other to the earth, palm down. They whirled for a long time, turning as gracefully as a leaf twirling on an autumn breeze. Their inward-focused eyes made it look as if they had