The Sword Of Medina (35 page)

For a moment, I knew hope. Standing on a knoll that overlooked the battlefield, I watched a boy ride into the center of the field with a sheaf of parchment held high in his gloved hands. Fear dilated the pupils of his eyes. His chain mail clanked. His hair lifted in the breeze like an angel’s wing, then lay on his head.
He should be wearing a helmet,
I remember thinking. As if armor could truly guard us from death.

“
Yaa
warriors for Ali and for the Mother of the Believers, take heed of this, the holy
qur’an
!” The boy waved the sheaf. “Our blessed
imam
, Ali ibn Abi Talib, sends me here with an admonishment: Remember al-Lah and His Prophet, may peace be upon him, and remember the prohibition against Muslims fighting Muslims. Al-Lah watches us today!”

As he spoke, hope surged in my breast. Did this appeal to the
qur’an
mean that Ali wanted to call off this battle? The
qur’an
warned Believers repeatedly about
fitna
as though al-Lah had seen this day coming. If Ali and his men followed the
qur’an
, they would stop this fight before it started.

I held my breath as I waited to hear the boy’s next words. Then, to my horror, an arrow struck him in the forehead and he toppled from his horse. A huge roar arose as each army blamed the other for the attack, and then men and horses rushed in a torrent onto the field while arrows darkened the sky.

I heard my name and turned to see Talha standing beside me. His
chestnut steed stood behind him, pawing the ground. “That arrow was launched by al-Ashtar,” he said. “I saw him crouching behind the great rock on the field’s edge.”

I narrowed my eyes, searching, suspecting who really wanted this war. Al-Ashtar, the instigator behind Uthman’s assassination, would have had the most to fear from mine and Ali’s agreement. Everyone, including the powerful Mu’awiyya, was demanding al-Ashtar’s head. If Ali had resigned the
khalifa
, would he still be able to protect his friend?

I turned to Talha, unable to speak. Had al-Ashtar been carrying out Ali’s command in attacking our camp this morning? Or had Ali slept, as I had, while al-Ashtar and his Bedouin friends had broken dishes, dumped out our water skins, toppled tents, and stabbed men—without their
imam’s
blessing?

“By al-Lah!” I cried, staring at Talha while the morning’s events raced through my mind. “We must stop this battle. Talha, can you call a truce?”

Talha shook his head. “Men are already killing each other. The Bedouins wouldn’t stop fighting now if Gabriel himself descended onto the field.” He paused, watching the swords and spears, screaming horses, and falling bodies. “I came to ask if you have seen al-Zubayr. One of our men saw him talking with Ali.”

I scowled. Had Ali convinced al-Zubayr to abandon our army and join his force, as several Bedouin clans had done this morning? But—no. Al-Zubayr was no allegiance shifter. He was a seasoned general who had vowed many times to knock Ali from his horse and from the
khalifa
.

“He must be out on the field.” I lifted my eyebrows. “Which is where you’re supposed to be.”

Talha grinned—able, somehow, to keep his sense of humor even in the face of death. “Hearing is obeying, Mother,” he said. His gaze locked with mine. “I came to pay my respects to you, A’isha. We are vastly outnumbered and outspirited, I fear, and destined to lose this fight. But—”

Panic swept through me, for if al-Zubayr had deserted us in body, Talha seemed to be doing so in spirit. “Lose? Never, by al-Lah! Get out there and show us all how a real
khalifa
wages war. We can do it, Talha! I feel victory in my soul. You don’t need al-Zubayr; you don’t need anyone.”

He stepped forward. I saw his intentions. and moved out of reach an instant before he tried to embrace me. His face reddened and, with a wry
glint in his eyes, he winked. “I need you, A’isha,” he said “Knowing you are watching and praying for me gives me all the confidence in the world. And there is something I want you to know: Before we left Mecca, Umm Kulthum told me she is pregnant. If the child is a girl, we will name her A’isha.”

Tears pushed against my eyes but I willed them away, wanting him to see only courage on my face. Their child, named for me! My sister must have known of Talha’s love for me. With this act, Talha had made our friendship a cherished gift, and Umm Kulthum had given it her blessing. If I died today, I would do so with a conscience free of guilt and a heart brimming with love.

“Thank you,” I whispered. “May al-Lah be with you, cousin.” He mounted his horse and rode down the hillside, galloping into battle with his spear pointed before him.

From my vantage, I watched the fighting with my heart slamming against my throat. That was my brother Mohammad clashing swords with my nephew Abdallah. Whom was I supposed to encourage in that duel?
Please, God, protect them both from harm
. What kind of prayer was that to offer during battle? How could al-Lah answer my prayers if I didn’t know what I wanted?

Horses whinnied, reared, and fell to the parched ground. Men ululated the fierce Bedouin war cry as if gargling blood. Bodies fell to the dirt. Boys scurried about with water skins—for Umar had long ago banished women from the Muslim battlefield—and knelt over the fallen, bandaging the wounds of the injured. I strained to see al-Zubayr’s horse with the chain-mail blanket, Talha’s yellow turban, and Abdallah’s tall figure, but the fighting and the dust were too thick for me to discern which side was winning.

Several hours later, my throat was hoarse from shouting, my water skin was empty, and the day’s heat was stifling. I eyed the shade of a small thorn-tree and wondered dizzily whether it was acceptable to sit while my troops toiled and bled in the sun. Then I saw my nephew Abdallah running toward me, his face streaked with dirt, sweat pouring down his skin, his helmet gone, his leather shield ripped. Talha followed behind, his chain mail broken and his hands smeared with blood.

“
Yaa
Aunt,” Abdallah said, gasping, “we need you on the field!”

My heart’s pounding filled my ears as, with hands that shook like leaves
in the wind, I grabbed the shield Muhammad had given me and clumsily pulled my sword from its sheath. Here, at last, was the
jihad
for which Muhammad had armed me. I took a ragged breath, then lifted my chin and straightened my back. Despite my heart’s sickness at the pitting of brother against brother, of Muslim against Muslim, the facts behind the battle were undeniable, and the verdict was this: Righteousness was in our camp, and so was victory. Ali was in the wrong. So I told myself.

“Come on, let’s go,” I said, and took a single step down the hill before Talha grabbed my sleeve to stop me.

“We can’t let you walk into this battle,” he said. “Your death would dispirit our men and ensure our loss.”

“But I thought you needed me!” I bristled with impatience.

“We do,” Abdallah said. “But not on foot. Like this!” He gestured with his hand toward our camp below, where a group of five or six men ran toward us leading a camel by its reins. A green-curtained
hawdaj
covered in chain mail swayed and clanked on its back.

“You want me to fight from the back of a camel?” I laughed in disbelief. “By al-Lah, are you
djinni
-possessed?”

“It’s the way they used to do it, in the olden days,” Abdallah said. “My grandfather Abu Bakr told me. When an army began to lose a battle, the men would bring a woman onto the field riding a camel, to rally the troops. Everyone would fight harder to protect her.”

I stuck my sword back into my belt. “I don’t want to perch myself on a camel while you fight,” I said. “I’d be much more valuable to you on the ground, killing the enemy, than sitting like a figurine on a shelf.”

Talha frowned. “By al-Lah, our army loses more men every minute you stand here protesting,” he said. “Do as I say, A’isha, for once. Trust me. With the Mother of the Believers in their midst, our men will increase their fighting. When Ali and his warriors see you, they’ll falter. This is the only way we can prevail.”

As much as I wanted to argue with him—I’d been practicing my sword-fighting with him, and we both knew I was not boasting when I’d said I could kill many men—I also respected this new Talha who had emerged, this serious, commanding general. I didn’t dare challenge his authority, not in front of my nephew and certainly not in front of these men who now had the camel kneeling before me. So without another word I mounted
the
hawdaj
and took my seat, peering out at my cousin as the animal stood and, swaying, took me into battle with Abdallah holding her reins.

“Remain inside!” Talha shouted as he walked beside me. “Don’t open your curtains for any reason, do you hear me? If you are even injured, we are lost. The chain mail will keep you safe, but only if you hold your curtain tightly shut.”

I let the fabric drop shut and sat back in my seat, intending to do his bidding. When the camel had stopped, I listened to the commotion and tried to figure out what was happening. “A’isha, the Mother of the Believers!” I heard Abdallah cry, and cheers flew up all around me. The clanging of swords followed, and shouts. The rich, metallic stench of blood and the reek of bowels made me gag. The air felt thick and hot inside my enclosure. I longed to pull the curtain aside but I remembered Talha’s commands. He would be the
khalifa
and I only an adviser. It was what I had wanted, and so it was my duty to obey him.

Then I heard a familiar cry. Gulping, I moved the curtain a few inches to see my beloved nephew falling to the ground, an arrow in his neck. His hand dropped the reins of my camel and another man rushed forward to grab them. I must have made a sound, for the man’s eyes turned upward to me and, in the next instant, he was impaled in the stomach by the spear of an enemy fighter, who then fell to the ground, stabbed by one of our warriors, who then took my camel’s reins.

I dropped the curtain and sat back in my seat, my stomach wrenching. Abdallah, dead! And another man, too, beloved by someone, a man who had given his life for me, his Mother. By al-Lah, I’d never wished for anything as much as I wished for my own death in that moment! Who was I to deserve these sacrifices? A spoiled, stubborn girl who’d been forced at a young age to marry the Prophet of God, who’d almost dishonored him because of her own selfish desires, and who’d spent the rest of her life in pursuit of two goals: revenge against Ali for judging me, and power and prestige for my family members.

Yaa
al-Lah, please end my life now,
I prayed, feeling as cold as if the fingers of a skeleton were scuttling along my spine.
If you are even injured, we are lost,
Talha had said. Wouldn’t my death mean an end to this battle? Suddenly, the question of the
khalifa
seemed as insignificant as the question of which robe to wear on a given day.
Take my life now, God,
and give the
khalifa
to whom You will. The decision was never in my power to begin with.

Then a strange
ping!
sounded in my
hawdaj
. Distracted from my prayers and my grief, I looked around for the source. There was only me and my wretchedness inside this curtain. Another sound like the last, but sharper, drew my gaze to an arrow sticking through the cloth.

My pulse raced as I realized that Ali’s men were shooting at me. Another arrow hit the
hawdaj
, and then another, until soon it sounded as if hailstones pelted my curtain. I felt my camel lurch under me, and heard a man shouting,
Hold that beast steady, or we will lose our Mother!

Our Mother. My heart lifted at the words. I was a Mother to them, just as Muhammad had been a Father. They had come to
islam
as meekly as lambs, like the runts I used to suckle with milk on my finger. These men had given up their homes and their families, their wives and earthly mothers, to come and fight for me—for me, the Mother of the Believers, for wasn’t I the one who had given the speeches denouncing Uthman’s assassination? Hadn’t I called them to arms? How could I have done all that simply out of revenge? No, my cause was just: to honor the memory of their Prophet by keeping alive his vision for
islam
.

Each arrow’s
ping!
made my pulse skip and skitter more wildly. What kind of Mother hides away when her children need her help? I had prayed to die, and now it looked as though I would. But by al-Lah, I might as well die in a manner befitting the favorite wife of God’s Prophet.

With a trembling hand I pulled al-Ma’thur, Muhammad’s legacy, from my sheath. Cowering had never been the way of A’isha bint Abi Bakr, as my husband had known.
Use it well in the
jihad
to come.
Here it was, the struggle he’d spoken of, and now it was incumbent upon me to do my duty. Then, when I met Muhammad in Paradise, I could tell him I’d done my best until the end, and that his sword had enabled me to die with honor.

I took a deep breath and pushed the curtain of my
hawdaj
aside, struggling, for the chain mail made it heavy. I thrust myself through the opening and kept my knees bent so as to move with the camel. I lifted my sword, intending to bring it down on Marwan. I was a moment too late, for he had just speared Talha in the leg, pinning his knee to his horse. Talha struck Marwan down in return, then glared at me. “Get back inside, A’isha!” he shouted. “Or you’ll be killed!”

Then he grabbed his leg and lost consciousness, slumping on his horse. The man next to him fell, his arm severed by an enemy’s sword, leaving the reins of my camel unguarded. Before I could take a breath, a Bedouin man had seized the reins—but when he glanced up at me, I noticed that it was one of our own warriors. He fought bravely, fending off attacker after attacker. I raised my sword, wanting to fight but my camel lurched, throwing me backwards into the
hawdaj
, where I landed hard on my tail bone. Wincing, I rubbed the sore spot—and realized that I had lost my sword. I poked my head out of the curtain again to search for it—and found it had been flung out of reach and was sticking in one of the ropes tethering my
hawdaj
to the camel. Every movement pressed the rope against the blade, fraying it more. Death seemed certain for me now. If arrows didn’t pierce me, my
hawdaj
would surely topple to the ground.