The Jewel Of Medina Read online

  While my sister-wives worked and chattered about how they’d spend their earnings, I slipped off to Sawdah’s hut. When she opened her door to me, she gasped in delight.

  “You waited long enough to come, by al-Lah!” she said. “Have our prayers been answered?”

  She laid me on her bed and pressed her hands against my belly as if feeling a melon for ripeness.

  “Mmm-hmm,” she said. “Just what I thought.”

  She pulled my legs apart and peered between them as if she could see into my womb. “Yes,” she said. “Yes.”

  She hefted my breasts.

  “Filling up. A good sign.”

  Then she examined my tongue, gazed into my eyes, and made the pronouncement I had not even dared speak in the mirror: I was pregnant with Muhammad’s child.

  My heart seemed to take wing, lifting me in great, excited leaps. At last, a baby of my own to love, to play with, to sing to, to hold and cherish and to give me grandchildren in my old age! I skipped around the room like a joyous child. At last I’d escape my servitude to Zaynab! Bearing Muhammad’s heir would place me in charge of the harim, out of her control forever. I threw my arms around Sawdah’s neck and embraced her.

  “Praise al-Lah, He has saved the best for the youngest,” she gushed, grinning hugely, when I finally let her go. Then, fingering her Evil-Eye amulet, she added, “May His will be done.”

  I kissed her again, then ran across the courtyard to Hafsa’s hut.

  “You’re not going to believe this!” I cried when she opened her door—but the wild gleam in her eyes and the flush in her cheeks stopped my burble of excitement like a hand clamped over my mouth.

  “Have you come with a strange tale, A’isha? Ha, ha! I have tales of my own. Alas, they’re too sordid to repeat.”

  She turned and disappeared into her hut. I followed and shut the door behind me. Her apartment was like mine, except darker—Hafsa hated the heat—and the walls and windowsills were bare. I smelled dust and a trace of musk—Maryam’s scent. As my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I noticed bits of broken clay clinging to her walls and, on the floor, shards of pots and bowls.

  “What happened?” I pointed to the piles of broken clay. Hafsa glared. “Yaa Hafsa, is there a body hidden somewhere?”

  “By al-Lah, I wish there were two!” A tear trickled down her cheek, but she wiped it away. “Yaa A’isha, Muhammad has ordered me not to tell a soul, but I must talk to someone. Why should I keep his tawdry secrets? Let him divorce me. I don’t care! Then at least I wouldn’t have to share my bedroom with that Egyptian harlot.”

  Then she told me: She’d spent the afternoon with a throbbing headache at her mother’s house, sipping sherbet and being fanned by servants.

  “You know I can’t bear these stifling summer days,” she said. “But I had no idea how hot it was in this apartment.”

  When she returned to the mosque, her face and hair damp with sweat, she headed to her hut for a nap.

  “When I opened the door, I found Muhammad and Maryam lying on my bed, kissing and embracing.”

  I gasped. “You walked in on them together?” Heat rushed through me as I tried to imagine the scene. “What did they do?”

  “They didn’t even know I was here until I smashed a bowl into the wall over their heads. That got their attention, ha, ha!” Her laughing mouth was a gash of pain. “I threw another, and Maryam clutched her clothes to her breast and ran out the door. Muhammad begged me to calm down before I brought the entire umma running. That’s all he cared about, A’isha: his reputation! His desire to be king of Hijaz has made him forget his compassion and his good sense.”

  A knock sounded at her door. “This hut has seen more visitors in one day than I’ve received all year,” Hafsa grumbled as she yanked it open. Muhammad stood in her doorway, his smile tentative.

  “I have come to ask how you are feeling, Hafsa.”

  “Why? Are you afraid I’ll tell my sister-wives how I found you making love to your concubine in my bedroom?”

  “We were not making love. We were only embracing. May I come inside?”

  So—Hafsa had caught Muhammad in her room with Maryam! This was the worst kind of insult. My temper spiked with hers.

  “That was quite an embrace,” Hafsa snapped. “So intense, you had to lie down. Or is that how the Egyptians do it?”

  “Maryam was feeling faint. That is why I brought her into your hut. I did not think you would mind.”

  “What was she doing here? Doesn’t she have an entire house to herself?”

  “Hafsa, I do not wish to have this conversation in the courtyard. May I please come inside?”

  “Fulfill your desires,” Hafsa said. “As you always do.”

  I greeted him with a glare, not bothering to hide my anger.

  “I have come to speak with Hafsa in private,” Muhammad said to me. “Leave us, please.”

  “Leave? Why? I already know everything. Except your excuse, of course.”

  The vein between his eyes throbbed. “Did I not ask you to keep our conflict between us, Hafsa?”

  “You had company in the committing of your deed,” she said. “Why should I suffer for it alone?”

  Muhammad’s countenance darkened. “We did nothing! But you have betrayed my confidence. How can I live with a wife I cannot trust?”

  “Did you ask this question before you married Abu Sufyan’s daughter?” I said.

  “Keep out of this, A’isha. Did I not ask you to leave us?”

  “Please remain.” Hafsa arched an eyebrow and looked down her long nose at Muhammad. “I would like a witness.”

  “I was only kissing Maryam.” Muhammad’s tone was flat. “We were celebrating her good news.”

  “Maryam’s going back to Egypt?” I said.

  “She is not going anywhere,” Muhammad said. “She is bearing my child.”

  I willed my fluttering pulse to calm down. Maryam, pregnant also? Just as Muhammad’s desire for me had been diluted by her, so, now, would his excitement at my news. Yet—my own joy would not be affected. A child was the one thing Maryam could not take away from me.

  Hafsa cawed like a crow. Muhammad smiled at me as though his mouth were filled with sweet cream. He wanted a son more than anything.

  “Congratulations, husband,” I said. “This is a special day for you. In truth, I’d say it’s doubly special. Because I discovered today that I’m pregnant, also.”

  His smile disappeared. The vein on his forehead bulged. “By al-Lah, I never imagined such audacity, even from you,” he said. “Are you so desperate for my attention that you must fabricate tales?”

  I reeled at the insult, but only for an instant. Within me beat the heart of my child, quickening my courage and my tongue.

  “I follow your example, Prophet,” I said. “You have become quite adept at the art of fabrication.”

  “When have I lied to you?”

  “Not five minutes ago, you said you were only giving Maryam a kiss when Hafsa walked in. Yet, according to Hafsa, Maryam grabbed her clothes as she ran from the hut.”

  “She was feeling faint,” Muhammad said. “She had removed her robe.”

  “Also, you say you treat all your wives equally. Yet when have you done so? Your true wives wait for affection that rarely comes, while you sow your seed in a woman who refuses to marry you.”

  “Enough!” Muhammad yelled. “You have said too much, as usual, A’isha.”

  “Then I will speak,” Hafsa said. “We are tired of broken promises and empty beds.”

  Muhammad glared at her. “Accustom yourself to an empty bed, Hafsa,” he said. “Since you have broken my confidence by telling A’isha what I asked you not to, I will respond by breaking my marriage contract with you. When I have spoken with Umar, you may take your belongings and rejoin your father in his home.”

  Hafsa’s face turned so pale, I rushed over to catch her in case she should faint. “How could you speak of divorce when you’ve forbidden you
r wives to remarry?” I said, glaring at him.

  “Al-Lah made that prohibition, not I.” His eyes held only darkness. “And the revelation spoke of my widows, not wives divorced from me. Any wife I release would be free to marry again.”

  Bilal’s call from the roof of the mosque sent confusion across all our faces. Muhammad flung open Hafsa’s door and strode into the courtyard. I started to follow, but I remembered Hafsa and stopped to reassure her.

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “He’s only angry. And that was just his first repudiation. He won’t make the other two.” For a man to divorce his wife, he had to declare the intention to her three times.

  “No, you spoke the truth,” Hafsa said. “We women of Hijaz are like tail-wagging dogs compared to Muhammad’s exotic Egyptian feline of a mistress.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “It’s impossible to compete.”

  The contest was about to become more intense. Bilal’s cry had announced the arrival of that much-awaited caravan from Yemen, the one bringing a new wife for Muhammad. We trudged like stones rolling across the grass to see her. Neither the colorful silks adorning the camels nor the incense scenting the air could arouse even a comment from any of us.

  Murmurs rustled through the crowd, heralding the bride-to-be. We watched her in silence at first, as though listening to a poem that told of high cheeks like figs, of eyelashes as long as a lover’s kiss, lips as full and dark as forbidden wine, skin like coffee, and a bosom like the twin hills of Mecca.

  “Say good-bye to your husband, sister-wives,” Raihana finally said. “This new toy won’t lose its appeal anytime soon.”

  “She is an exotic flower drawing every eye,” Saffiya complained.

  “By al-Lah, another foreigner to make us all seem common,” Hafsa said. “Raihana speaks the truth. We’ll never see Muhammad again.”

  “Yaa Hafsa, where is your spirit?” I stared at her. “You’ve never been so quick to submit.”

  Hafsa’s face slumped. “Look at her, A’isha!”

  I looked—and saw Muhammad help his new bride-to-be down from her camel. Her smile outdazzled the jewels dripping from her throat, ears, arms, and ankles—a smile that didn’t reach her eyes—but it was those gently swelling breasts, rising like soft cushions from the scoop of her gown, that tugged at Muhammad’s gaze.

  “Don’t be fooled by her suggestive clothing. She’s a complete innocent, with a father more strict than Umar,” I murmured to Hafsa and Saffiya. “She’s harmless.”

  Then as Muhammad instructed her servants, I saw her eyes move to the face of her escort, a tall man in clothing of gold thread with a fine long nose and eyes that seemed to shoot daggers into the back of Muhammad’s neck. Fear contorted the woman’s face as if she were screaming and her lips moved beseechingly, but the man’s face hardened and his jaw ticced.

  In the next moment Muhammad stood and smiled at her. Both she and the escort beamed so benignly I wondered if I’d imagined their exchange.

  I would have to find out. “I think we should befriend this one,” I said to Saffiya and Hafsa. “Let’s offer to help her prepare for the wedding.”

  “You want to be her tire woman?” Saffiya shook her head. “Pregnancy must addle the brain.”

  Hafsa eyed me suspiciously. “What’s running through your mind?”

  “I’d like to get to know her. Wouldn’t you?” I gave Hafsa a pointed look. She shrugged. Later, when we were alone, I’d tell her what I’d seen. My instincts pointed to danger—but before I could go to Muhammad I’d have to know more. He wouldn’t believe me otherwise, and I couldn’t afford another mistake.

  I linked arms with Hafsa as she and I walked toward our huts. “Yaa Hafsa,” I said, leaning close to her ear. “There are all kinds of ways to prepare a woman for marriage.”

  CONSPIRING WITH THE ENEMY

  LATER THAT DAY

  Alone in my room that night, I waited for Muhammad and fretted over his words to Hafsa. Would he utter the remaining repudiations and send her back to Umar? My breath tore in my throat, frayed by the notion. If Muhammad would divorce Hafsa, the daughter of his close Companion, were any of us safe? Was I?

  In spite of my turmoil, my stomach demanded food. Since I’d become pregnant, my appetite was a deep, unfillable well. I stepped out to the cooking tent, but in the courtyard I stopped at the sight of shadows sweeping like crows’ wings across the night. I heard the snap of a twig and flattened my body against the wall, watching for the pounce, listening for the snarl or growl of something wild. Their watering holes sucked dry by the drought, jackals had begun haunting our streets at night in search of water. Sawdah said when they became this desperate, they’d hunt humans to drink our blood.

  I heard a muffled cry. Across the courtyard, a dark figure slumped to the ground. When it arose I saw that it was no jackal, but something far more sinister. My heart drummed its warning as I discerned the outline of a man stumbling from hut to hut, pulling curtains aside and peering into windows. I watched him stare into my apartment and, finding no one there, move quickly away. When the light crossed his form, rage snarled in my breast.

  It was Abu Sufyan who peered in the windows, grinning at what he saw in Hafsa’s apartment, lingering at Zaynab’s, then waving excitedly at the window of his daughter Umm Habiba. He waddled around to the front door and waited there until she opened it, then slipped inside. And I was the only one who’d seen him enter.

  So Umm Habiba was a spy! How many times had her father visited her these past months? Had she helped Abu Sufyan plan the Bedouin raid on those Ghatafani shepherds, the attack that had broken the peace treaty? Had she passed information to him that our army was preparing to invade Mecca?

  Like many in the umma, I worried that Quraysh would attack us first. When I’d told Muhammad this, he’d said he wasn’t afraid.

  “We have become too mighty for Abu Sufyan to fight, let alone conquer,” he said.

  What would he say when I told him of Umm Habiba’s treachery? Would he believe me? He’d scoffed today when I’d told him I was carrying his child. “Desperate,” he’d called me. Why would he listen to me now?

  I ran to the majlis, where Muhammad and his Companions dined and talked politics with his new fiancée’s escort, the Yemeni emissary. I caught my father’s eye and summoned him away from the meal, then told him in a hushed voice what I had seen.

  “Abu Sufyan, here?” His body tensed. “We must alert Muhammad.” He turned to head back into the majlis, but stopped. “Are you certain it was him, A’isha?”

  “Of course I’m certain!”

  “Did you see his face?”

  I faltered, trying to remember. “I saw his fat body,” I said. “And I saw him walk into Umm Habiba’s hut.”

  He stroked his beard. “I will go and investigate. But our dinner is nearly finished. If Muhammad comes out, will you tell him where I have gone?”

  Alarm jabbed me with its bony finger, and I grabbed his arm. “No, abi! You can’t go alone. It is too dangerous—”

  He patted my shoulder. “I and Abu Sufyan used to do business together,” he said. He leaned close to whisper, “His fighting skills are atrocious.”

  As I waited for Muhammad to emerge, worry and excitement tugged my thoughts in different directions. Would he believe me when I told him what I’d seen? My accusations against Maryam had made him suspicious of me. He now saw me as a jealous schemer determined to destroy his other marriages. In fact, he couldn’t be further from the truth. I hated sharing him with so many, but I knew the value of each alliance. Yet where Umm Habiba was concerned, I had good cause for suspicion. Would my discovery of her father’s visit redeem me in Muhammad’s eyes?

  About ten minutes later, the men stepped out of the majlis in twos and threes, talking among themselves, unaware of the presence of their enemy in our household or of the danger lurking in the eyes of the Yemeni emissary. I stood in the shadows with my wrapper over my face, waiting for Muhammad. When he appeared, I asked him to follow me to
my apartment.

  Inside my apartment, I let my wrapper drop. “Umm Habiba is a spy,” I said. Before I could continue, his anger swept like a storm over us both.

  “Damn your accusations!” he said, gritting his teeth. “If I hear another slander from your lips about your sister-wives—”

  “This is no slander.” I forced myself to speak calmly although his anger shook me. “I saw Abu Sufyan in the courtyard. My father has gone to confront him.”

  “Abu Sufyan?” Questions gathered on Muhammad’s brow.

  “He sneaked into the hut of his daughter. The one he sent to spy on us.”

  Muhammad glowered. “Umm Habiba is no spy.”

  “And I’m not a redhead.”

  “She has been a devout Muslim for many years. Abu Sufyan tried to kill her husband after he converted. The two of them fled to Abyssinia years ago.”

  “And without her husband, what is she now?” My voice rose in protest. “Her father’s enemy or his ally?”

  “Her hatred for Abu Sufyan has caused her much pain. If he visited her, it was without her permission.”

  “So that’s why she wanted to marry you,” I hurled, wanting to hurt him as his disbelief had hurt me. “Not to spy on Abu Sufyan, but to punish him.” His low growl told me he was about to shout again, but my father’s knock interrupted us.

  His smile was grim as he entered and bowed to Muhammad. “Congratulations. Your enemy is vanquished. Abu Sufyan trembles at rumors of a Muslim invasion. Although he will not admit it, he has come to plead for mercy.”

  Muhammad took a deep breath and looked at me. Contrition flashed in his gaze before he returned my father’s smile.

  “This is in truth good news,” he said. “But why did he not approach me with an official delegation?”