Worldsoul

Interlude

She had lived in this apartment for over twenty years, ever since Ibrahim’s death. It would have felt wrong to leave it, as though she were leaving him behind, and she was not ready to do that. Some women married again, but she knew that she would not: the inclination was not there. Besides, his spirit returned to her, on the great days, and although she knew he was at peace with God, she was always happy to see him.

If she had gone to live somewhere else, he would not have known his way around.

With care, because her joints were not good today, she re-arranged the roses in their bowl. Her daughter brought her these, grown in her courtyard garden. They reminded her of sunsets and she loved to look at them.

On this particular evening, she had left the windows open. A ward glistened across the open space, so she was surprised to turn and find someone there.

“Oh!” she said, relieved. “It’s you.” She put a hand to her heart. “For a moment, I thought it was Ibrahim. Or, Allah forbid, an intruder.”

“I am sorry,” her visitor said. “I should have knocked.”

She smiled. “On the air itself? Sit. Have some tea. Or at least, the pretence of tea.”

It was his turn to smile. “I like the smell. I’ll have some, if I may.”

She brought it on a silver tray and they sipped, inhaled, in silence for some minutes. Then her visitor said, “You’re wondering why I’ve come. I’m afraid it’s not good news.”

Her heart sank. “I thought as much. There have been signs, the usual portents. Someone saw a bloodstained lion in the Medina last week. People have had visions. There’s been a great deal of astrological mayhem going on: peculiar conjunctions of the heavens.”

“I can’t tell you what it heralds, because I don’t know. But there’s been a change at the end of the world.”

“That’s not good,” she said. “The end of the world-well, if you walk far enough away from there, you’ll end up here.”

“Something’s happening, Mariam,” the Messenger said. Against the brocaded cushions of the couch, she could see his faint illuminated transparency, visible only in certain lights. This was a projection, if a good one. Messengers can do that, dissolve and reform at will. “Something’s changing,” he continued. “The question is, what?”