Page 17 of The Lustrous Dark
Rabia tends the earth, and Rasha draws the tide.
With the sun, Noor dances, and on the wind, Iman rides.
Earth, flame, water, air.
We remember their names, our Lallat fair.
—a Hazmaggi chant
Shay hates coming to the slum. It breaks her heart to see small children playing in dirty puddles and napping next to fly-covered piles of debris. Yet, she can't help noticing how the women talk and smile brightly among themselves as they hang clothes and carry water. They seem happy despite their lack of what others deem necessities.
It doesn't take long for a young boy to come running up to Shay. With unmatched slippers on his feet and his tiny frame swallowed beneath an adult-sized tunic, he's hardly the fearsome rebel the barkeep led Shay to believe she'd be greeted by.
He stretches his open hand up and out. “Labas, Lalla. Something for me? Please?”
Shay fishes the last luneers from her satchel. God knows it isn't much, butwhen she presses the coin into his palm, the child's face brightens into a heart-melting grin.
“God protect you,” she offers hoarsely.
The child tucks the luneers into his pocket. He grabs her hand and sprinkles the top of it with kisses. “May He bless you and your parents.”
Tears prickle Shay's eyes at the innocent blessing. Ghita is the closest thing to a parent she has known, and the midwife surely deserves God's rewards. But what of the mother she hopes to find, the one the barkeep accused of luring young women into a life of addiction? Is such a woman eligible for redemption?
Shay takes a step forward, when the boy springs in front of her.
He glances first to one side then the other, fidgeting in place. “Are you going the right way, Lalla?”
Shay peers into the distance, trying to determine what the boy is looking at. Finding nothing amiss along the uneven belt of makeshift shelters, she squats at eye level with the child and lowers her voice. “Is someone watching us?”
The boy scratches his dirty arm and nods nervously.
Telling herself the worst that can happen is she'll be turned away, Shay holds her palm up in a khamsa sign, her three middle fingers touching, pinky and thumb separated out to the sides. She lifts her hand high enough to be seen by whoever is hiding. To complete the signal, she rolls her fingers into a fist that represents the all-seeing eye of protection and taps it to her forehead.
The boy's shoulders relax, but he tips his chin higher. “That's the secret signal. But do you know thesecretsecret signal?”
Shay frowns, her throat tightening. The barkeep didn't mention asecretsecret signal. She gazes up at the bright white of the noonday sun. It floats in a pool of soft yellow like a reverse egg. But there are no clues written among the clouds. Sweat gathers in her palms.
“Just kidding!” The boy chuckles and winks at her. “There is no secret secret signal.”
“M'zein.” Shay stands, her panic dissolving into laughter. “You fooled me that time. But I have a serious question. Do you think one of your friends out there would be willing to help me find someone?”
“It's your lucky day, Lalla.” The child puffs his small chest. “Badar knowseveryonein the Bib.”
“I see.” Shay swallows uneasily. She assesses the boy's tender frame. Is it even safe for him to be running about unsupervised here? “What about the traps?”
The boy looks at her askance. He pats his arms and legs, grinning widely. “I still have all my limbs, don't I?”
Badar scampers over stone blocks and wood beams. Shay's heart hammers with exertion and the fear that a misstep will trigger a trap and she'll be sliced by a swinging knife or crushed under an avalanche of rocks. The child races, his stride never breaking, down the narrow rows that run between crowded shelters. Many residents have hung torn sheets for privacy where their walls are lacking, half the stones having crumbled away.
Some dwellings, Shay notices with more than a little unease, openly display the checkered flag of the Naturalists. The offense would be unthinkable elsewhere in Nezjar. One building even has their slogan painted on its side:A COMMON GOAL FOR A COMMON PEOPLE!
The deeper into the Bib they plunge, the clearer it becomes that not everyone here is happy. Touched ones linger in dark corners. The emaciated women alternately pick at their scabbed skin and yank what little is left of their thinning hair. Each twitch is like a move in a compulsive dance they've been cursed to perform.
Their backs are hunched, their hands curled into claws. Warts bubble on their faces. One dried husk of a woman sits right out in the open on a palm leaf mat, appearing at risk of being bowled over by the faintest of breezes. She pulls a dropper of amber liquid from a glass vial and squeezes a glistening drop onto her tongue.
Shock ripples through Shay's body. The touched one throws her head back, her papery eyelids fluttering. A white film spreads over her irises and blots herpupils. Her black lips melt into a sloppy grin, exposing teeth in the early stages of decline. Red wisps of light pulse at her fingertips.
Shay's skin turns cold. After all these cycles of believing her mother is dead, will she now find her to be alive but trapped in same thrall of addiction as these women?
