Read Online The Jewel Of Medina by Sherry Jones - Free Book Online

so soon.”
    The silk felt cool and soft against my skin, like water. The neck of the gown scooped slightly, baring the hollow pressed like a thumbprint into my throat. The white sleeves rippled loose at the shoulders, then tapered to encircle my wrists like a father’s hand. For a moment, I felt beautiful—until my mother offered me my reflection in a piece of polished brass and I noted my hair’s garish color, like a flag, and the muddy green tint of my eyes. Why couldn’t I have lovely dark features like the beauties the poets wrote about?
    I asked for a scarf or wrapper, but my mother shook her head. “The Prophet loves your red hair. You know that.”
    Another devil-wind began deep in my stomach, then whirled wider and higher until I thought it would consume me completely. By al-Lah, it was already beginning! The marriage hadn’t even happened yet, and already Muhammad—or, at least, the idea of him—was determining how I should dress.
    I saw my dreams of freedom fade like the light from my grandmother’s eyes as she’d lain on her deathbed. Dizziness staggered me. This was not my life! I, A’isha, was supposed to wield a sword and race camels in the desert. Instead I was about to march under my
ummi’s
glaring eye to a life of servitude with a
shaykh
—an old man—and the toothless, grinning Sawdah as my only companions.
    But the promise of a rescue brightened my mood like a shimmering oasis on the desert horizon. By the time Sawdah poked her jowly face into the room and announced that “he” was ready, I’d talked a smile onto my lips. My mother must have noticed the change because she squeezed my shoulder in a rare sign of affection.
    “Such pride you bring to our family today,” she said in a choked voice. I turned away from her, ready to bolt, but she stopped me with a hand on my arm.
    “Walk slowly, with your head high, for everyone will be watching,” my mother said. “A bride carries herself with dignity.”
    But how, with legs that trembled as if they had no bones? I wobbled as I walked, my legs growing heavier with each step and my pulse thudding in my ears, into the dim
harim,
the women’s living area, where women rattled tambourines and lamp flames flung dancing shadows on the walls. Raha floated like a cloud to me, her eyes shining, and handed me a fragrant bouquet of lavender.
    “Be strong, Little Red,” she whispered as she pressed her cheek to mine. “Al-Lah will reward you for it.” Then she turned to the other women and lifted her hands into the air. “Our A’isha, exalted above all women!” she cried.
    Ululations filled the room like the warbles of a thousand and one birds. Shining, smiling faces swirled before me like colors through a prism. Sawdah, grinning and showing her black teeth and blacker holes whereteeth used to be, strew rose petals at my feet. Their fragrance softened the faint unctuous tinge of burning lamp oil before getting lost among the perfumes the women wore. Muhammad’s daughters from his marriage to Khadija, who had died years ago, stood in a cluster and watched the procession: Ruqayyah, pale as the belly of a pigeon and smiling wanly; Umm Kulthum, broad-waisted and robust; and bland, bowl-faced Fatima, whose polite smile didn’t reach her eyes. Where was Safwan’s mother? I glanced past the faces before me, into the corners, into the hallway beyond. Hadn’t she made the journey from Mecca with her son?
    “Keep going,” my mother whispered. “To mine and your father’s bedroom. The Prophet waits for you there.”
    I stepped into the dark hallway, my legs still shaking. No one had to tell me to walk slowly now. My pulse charged my legs with blood, urging them to run—but in the opposite direction. Just beyond the curtain to my parents’ bedroom, I could hear the laughter and shouts of men. Men! I had been cut off from them for so many years—and now I was going to have to walk into a room full of them.
    One by one Muhammad’s daughters