Prologue

 

I began with the rushing hydrocarbon wind that ascends through the rock from the shale beds far below, blasting through the sand and erupting in a vast conflagration of fire. I do not remember the act of creation that engendered me and my brothers and sisters of flame, but I have seen it many times since and believe it was the same for me. The ground trembles and a distant thunder draws ever closer; the rocks dancing and the sand thrown upward with the approach of the underground wind. Then the surface of the land lifts into the air, and the rocks and sand grains strike together so violently great currents of electricity form in the dry air. Lightning rips through the swirling mass. The explosion that envelops the desert sands is red, orange and yellow, concentrating into white brilliance in the centre with small pockets of the deepest blue here and there. When the flames that consume the uprushing gas die away, when the intense heat fades and the fused sand glimmers like glass; these cold smokeless blue flames remain and sentience stirs within them.

I have gone by many names over the countless years of my existence, but in the desert lands of my creation, I and my brothers and sisters of the smokeless fire are called djinn and are generally feared by members of that other creation - mankind. In those early days, of course, I had no knowledge of man or of anything else in the world about me, being little more than a blue flame tinged with green that burned in the lonely places. I was aware of self and a vast outer not self, but being new, I was concerned solely with self and for long ages gave little thought to what lay around me. What need had I of what was not me? After a long time, time measured not in days or even years but rather in the slow oscillation of the bright points of light that wheeled slowly in the sky above me. I turned my attention outward. Curiosity drove me, and I wondered that anything could truly exist that was not me.

I saw much and understood little, but gradually I was able to piece together facts, assimilate them into groups and start to make sense of the world. I wandered the land, mountain and valley, desert and plain, venturing into forests and caves and even the rushing streams and restless seas, observing and growing in knowledge. Not mean feats for a smokeless blue flame that can see without eyes, hear without ears and understand without a brain. How was I able to do these things? As well you might ask a man how he stands upright on two legs and walks around. He cannot describe it - he just does it. So it was with me. I could not say how I did such things; I just accepted them as natural and did them. Now, after thousands of years, I have grown in knowledge and understanding. I have my theories of magnetic fields and patterned plasma, but I will not bore you with them. If you are of the djinn, you will know; if you are not, you probably cannot know.

In the early days, I saw the creation of my own kind and saw how I must have come about. I often approached these little dancing flames in the scorched aftermath of the act of genesis, but they never responded to my inquiries. I could feel their introspective sentience, dim and flickering, but nothing more. I have seen this act of creation many times, though less in recent years. I do not know if this is because the creative force has lessened with time, or if it is because the vast pockets of gas that form above the oil-rich shale beds deep underground are now all but exhausted. No doubt many djinn exist, but I seldom see another one now. I think we are solitary beings, having little in common with each other beyond the hot fire of our creation and the cold fire of our being, and even less with the coarse material creation that preceded us.

For a long time, I wandered the earth, crossing continents and seas, watching the pulse of glaciers and the rise and fall of the oceans, but I always found myself drawn back to the place I was created. Each time I returned, I found things had changed - the land grew dryer, animals moved away or died out, the scattered tribes of men fought and died or managed to live in harmony with their neighbours but still died. Man is short-lived, gone almost in the blink of his eye, and I remain for I am something greater than man. How much greater? I did not find out for some time. Some things I found out quickly by observing my surroundings and the creatures that inhabit it. For instance, I live but I do not grow. I sprung fully formed from the earth fires, whereas man grows from an infant to a child to an adult. I do not eat or drink but feed instead from energy. Not just the raw energies of the white light that flashes from the storm-clad heavens to the earth, but also from the energy that binds the life force of man and animal. I can feed on the electrical currents that keep men alive and drain them of life and soul, strengthening my own.

I do not produce others of my kind; djinn arise only from the smokeless fires and have no need of sex. I think, though not with a fleshy brain, and because I have no distractions of the flesh, my intellect is greater than a man's, my purpose stronger and my will indomitable. Men are governed by their appetites, and I often use their lusts to achieve my own ends. Humans are so easy to control; a word here, a promise there, and they fall over themselves to do my will. There are some, I admit, with greater control of their own intellect. They can govern their own minds, being fixated on higher goals: love, family, the service of a god or goddess; yet even these can be governed and directed, if I just take the time to appear not as I am but rather how they wish to see me.

I have mentioned gods and goddesses, and for a long time in the days after I came to be, I wondered about these beings. No doubt you want to know if they exist. Before I can answer that I suppose I must ask what is a god? I have asked this question of many people down the ages, for you must not suppose that I always exist as a still, blue flame. Sometimes I put on the guise of a man or woman and walk the earth. When I am in the guise of a man, I think and feel more as a man does. I experience lust, anger and pain, but also curiosity and a hunger for knowledge. I seek out the learned men, the priests and scribes, and draw out the contents of their minds, before I shatter the bonds that hold their brains together, feasting on the rich, dark energy of their being as their life force gutters and dies.

I have learned men see god as many things: all-powerful, all-knowing, capricious, loving, merciful, cruel, able to be placated or bribed but also quick to seek vengeance, jealous, proud and beautiful, having the attributes of creator, preserver and destroyer. They have all the worst faults of men but also the best attributes. I know; how can a god be all these things? In short, he cannot. Have I ever met a god? Yes, and he or she was some of these things but never all. I have seen the still blue flames riding the thunderclouds, dancing in the molten rock that spews from the belly of the earth or lifted aloft in the whirlwind. I have conversed with the flames that often sit atop hills, wrapped up in their own existence, thinking their own hill shrine is the centre of creation. These little Baals, as they are called, have a tribe of men to worship them and make the blood offering, burning the flesh of beasts that the god may feed. It is not the burnt meat of an animal's thigh, the fat that drips and sputters in the consuming flames or the blood pumping from a slit throat that is important to these little gods, but the life force they desire. I should know, for I am a flame myself. That is all a god is, believe me. Every god I have come across, every being happy to take what men offer so freely of their neighbour's livestock or of their own, is a flame - one of the djinn.

Many flames take names, for men do not like to worship a nameless god. Djinn may take the name of a hill, an attribute or one of the forces of nature. There are thunder gods, rain gods, sea gods, sky gods, and gods of war, of love, of soldiers, of shepherds, of the sun, moon and planets - a deity for any and every purpose. And as long as men need them, you can be sure there will be a flame ready to exploit these gullible creatures. Not all gods are strong, many being limited to a single hill or spring or grove of trees. Others wander the earth and walk about in it, taking life where they will. I have done both in my long existence. For a while, I wandered, and then for an age, I sat in a high place and was content. Then a man came and named me in fear and wonder, and I thought, Why not? I too will become a god.

Yes, a man first named me. Or rather, he thought of my name, and I plucked it from his mind, for the minds of men are open to the djinn. You look uncomfortable. Do you fear that I can see the thoughts in your mind? Why would I bother? Most men think of little beyond their immediate needs and desires. Of course, should I desire to, you probably will not even know I am doing it. You would feel nothing beyond a mild ringing in the ears or a feeling you are being watched. Have you ever felt eyes watching you and turned only to find no one was there? That was me, or one like me, delving into the soft matter of your brain, chasing your thoughts and tapping into your life force. You might have felt tired later, but if the djinn did not drink too deeply you recovered. Despite what the legends say, we are not necessarily ravening monsters, killing indiscriminately. It is much better to taste and move on, returning to sip again from an ever-renewing resource.

Do I taste all life? Do I sip from the wellsprings of animal and human alike? I have done so, but I prefer the taste of men. Their thoughts and emotions are raw and savage, as they exercise choice; whereas animals are largely governed by instinct. I can leave an animal untouched, but sooner or later I will feast on any human I get close to. It is in my nature, perhaps. I am a djinni, after all ... unless I aspire to be more.

I aspired to be more. I took a name and godhead. A name should be more than just an empty sound though; it should mean something. The name I took was a fitting name, for it reflected my nature, my position in creation and the place that was then my favoured abode. It meant high, lofty, sublime, in the tongue of the human inhabitants of the place of my being. Though I was created in the sandy wasteland and am at home in that hot, dry desolation, it is the mountains that call to me, where the air is clear and the rock clean and unspoiled. The wind sweeps between the peaks, and the only sound is the harsh cry of the raptor circling high above in the pale blue dome of the sky. There I sit, the flame of my being motionless in the gale that blows about me, and I contemplate the empty land stretched out before me. I was named Aali of the High Places. I may have stayed Aali of the High Places and been no more than a spirit alone on a mountain, but something changed within me when that first man made an act of worship and I became a god in his eyes. Once I was a god, of course, a simple name like Aali was not enough. I decided to leave my lofty domain and venture into the world again. I found the world much changed with men burgeoning upon the land, but I had ambition. I was no longer content to be a small baal, a nameless djinni. I would become a god, maybe even the God. Yes, I am laughing as I say that, but why not? Who is to stop me? Men cannot and only very powerful djinn could do so, but I do not know of any strong enough.

And so, on a day like countless thousands that had gone before, a man came to me. He was not looking for me, but his coming changed everything.

 

Chapter One

 

Ab'rim sat on a rock in the low foothills in the southern part of the mountain chain that ran along the western side of the Arabian Peninsula and regarded his charges gloomily. This was unusual for him as he was known among his neighbours as a cheerful person, but he thought he had good reason. The past two seasons had been hard ones; the monsoon rains that swept in from the southwest lighter than usual and the grazing had suffered. He looked up at the clear blue sky and muttered a prayer to his many gods for rain, especially Hubal, god of shepherds. Ab'rim waited hopefully, but no sign appeared to show his pleas had been answered. He shrugged and turned back to his contemplation of his small herd of goats.

The animals were healthy but starting to show the effects of poor nutrition. Months of grazing on the sparse vegetation had all but denuded the rocky slopes, and now the beasts spread out over the hillside, scraping at the stony ground in the hopes of uncovering a morsel of edibility. Most ignored their herder, intent on finding food, but one old ewe, the leader of the flock, lifted her head from her foraging from time to time to make sure the man was still there. Eventually she bleated, alerting the man to the straying of the flock.

Ab'rim picked up a handful of stones and worked his way across the hillside, judicious placement of the missiles herding the animals together again. He squatted and caressed the old female goat, calling her his Bahiyya, his beautiful one, and she responded by butting her head gently against him. He rose and started slowly up the slope, picking his way between the boulders. She followed, and the other goats fell into line behind her, dutifully climbing the faint track worn into the loose rock and soil. They crossed the hill and dipped down into a small valley on the other side where a tiny bit of moisture had collected, stimulating coarse grasses which had now run to seed and were turning brown. The goats hurried forward, bleating with excitement, and soon consumed every scrap of plant material down to its roots.

At noon or as near as Ab'rim could judge the hour by the position of the sun, he found what shelter he could under a towering rock and consumed a small meal of bread and two dried dates. He washed it down with tepid water from a skin flask and sat back, picking at tiny fragments of food caught in his chipped but otherwise healthy teeth with a broken fingernail. The goats sought scraps of shade beside the larger boulders and lay down. For an hour or more, the only movement in the valley was the occasional flicking of ears or waving of hands to dislodge the persistent flies.

By midafternoon, the goats were on the move again and Ab'rim and Bahiyya led the flock over the valley rim and angled across the next slope, working up toward the mountains. Ab'rim knew water flowed downward and vegetation was usually found on the lower slopes and the plains beneath the hills, but the years of drought had stripped the land of life. He reasoned the water had to come from somewhere and the gullies that dissected the steep-sided mountains may yet harbour moisture and fodder. The alternative was to go over ground already covered. His goats would find no food below, so he must chance everything on the high places.

Reasoning may have led to Ab'rim's decision, but the logic did not ease his mind. Other herders told stories of the wild places far from human habitation, and he had heard tales of strange beasts and even stranger things that walked the night. He did not look forward to the coming night, but he knew he must brave it or let his little flock starve. The look of reproach on his wife's face would be more than he could bear if he returned with a hungry herd just because he feared the darkness.

The night came swiftly as the sun vanished behind the mountains and the long cold shadows swept down from the heights. Ab'rim gathered his goats into a small area of the gully and rolled a few rocks across the most obvious gaps. Rocks alone would not pen his beasts as goats delight in climbing, but the presence of apparent boundaries often sufficed to keep them close. As darkness closed in, they huddled close, deriving security from the presence of the man.

Ab'rim made a small fire from a pinch of sawdust, a wisp of dried grass and dehydrated dung, twirling his firestick with a short length of cord from his pouch. The point rested in a hollow in a flat piece of wood, and as the stick spun and whirred, tiny wisps of smoke curled upward. In the silence of the evening, even this faint sound was loud in his ears, and it worried him as there was no telling what might be drawn to the steady noise. At last the sawdust caught fire, and he nursed the wisp of grass with the dry undigested plant fibres from the dung and a few brittle twigs. The resultant fire was small and produced almost no heat, but it threw back the darkness for a time and gave him a measure of comfort. Later the moon rose over the low plain, flooding the mountainside with a pale light and throwing inky shadows across the rock-strewn landscape. Things moved in the shadows, small things admittedly, but Ab'rim was nervous of the rustlings, squeaking and hissing and gabbled many prayers to his gods for their protection. Hubal he petitioned - god of shepherds, dominant in this season of the waxing moon; Manaf the sun god, who, though absent from the sky, had the power to banish all shadows; and of course, Al-Lat, the mother goddess. Ab'rim felt uncomfortable praying for help to a female god, but his wife, Hajar, had assured him of the Mother's power. He prayed too that the gods could hear his whispers as he feared raising his voice and attracting attention from other things. After a while, a near silence descended over the hillside, and he fell asleep warmed by the bodies of the nearest goats.

The dawn came, the sun rising over the plains and spreading a golden blanket over the high mountains, while the valleys yet remained in shadow. Ab'rim gave thanks to his gods again, especially Manaf now, and roused the animals, opening up the pen and ushering them further up the rocky gully. He had nothing with which to break his fast, so he took out his leather sling and hunted around for smooth water-worn pebbles. The goats moved slowly, and he was able to keep an eye on their wanderings and still scan the rocks and sky for prey. Despite the apparent lack of vegetation, there was considerable life on the mountain. By the time he stopped at noon, he had two songbirds, a mouse and several locusts in his pouch. He consumed the locusts raw but skinned and gutted the birds and mouse for his evening meal, putting the feathers and skin as well as the tiny corpses back in his pouch together with a few scraps of wood and dried dung.

His second night on the mountain was more comfortable than the first, and because no threat had eventuated the first night, Ab'rim felt considerably more relaxed. The goats found grazing in a small shallow basin where a pool of water still existed, dampening the soil sufficiently to stimulate grasses. He made his camp with his back to an overhanging rock wall and cooked his meat on a tiny fire. Bahiyya stood and stared disapprovingly with her yellow eyes, while the man devoured the half-cooked morsels, crunching the bones between his teeth and licking his fingers to absorb every hint of delicious juice. Ab'rim settled back, ready for sleep, his belly nearly full and wrapped himself in his robe against the chill night air. After watching the stars for a time, he drifted into sleep.

A scream ripped the night apart, a long wailing cry that guttered into despairing sobs before dying away. Ab'rim jerked awake and sat bolt upright, his back to the rock wall. Visible only as vague shapes, the goats were on their feet, staring off up the invisible gully, motionless and silent. The moon hid behind clouds, and the darkness pressed around, hiding whatever it was screaming on the mountain top. The night was very quiet now, as if waiting and watching for the thing to scream again.

A demon. An Ifrit or djinni ... O Al-Lat, Holy Mother, preserve me. Ab'rim gabbled prayers under his breath to every god he could think of, then he pulled his sling out with shaking hands and fitted a pebble into it. What good is that going to do? He remembered tales told around campfires when he was a boy and fumbled in his pouch. He drew out a handful of small feathers and pushed them one by one into the smouldering embers of his tiny fire. The stink of charring feathers curled up and around him in the still air making him cough. Burning feathers repel demons ... I hope. The scream was not repeated, and after a while, the goats settled down again. My prayers or the feathers worked. Ab'rim prayed again, offering up thanks for his deliverance, and many hours later toward dawn, he even slept.

The next morning, Ab'rim debated whether to stay high in the mountains or to descend to the plains once more. The scream of the demon had scared him, but the burning feathers and prayers had evidently seen it off. If it even was a demon ... The bright sunshine made him feel much braver, and he scanned the slopes confidently. He knew there was little chance of finding forage on the plains, but there was still vegetation to be found in the isolated gullies of the mountain. Fear warred against pride and the needs of his herd. The morning sun tipped the scale, the warmth and brightness of the day strengthening his resolve, banishing his fears. His small herd looked to him for guidance, alternately cropping the last of the grasses in the basin or looking silently at him as he made his decision.

"We go up," he told Bahiyya.

The old she-goat bleated mournfully but followed him willingly enough as he set off up the gully, the rest of the herd trailing after them. The bed of the dried stream steepened almost immediately, and Ab'rim found himself having to use both hands to scramble upward. The goats had little trouble negotiating the rocky incline, leaping nimbly from rock to boulder, step to ledge and calling encouragingly to each other. By early afternoon, he was higher up the mountain than he had ever been. He found a level space where a few stunted and wind-gnarled shrubs clung to the thin soil. The animals spread out, nipping at buds and even stripping the bark from the woody plants. Ab'rim looked out at the plain that lay far below him, trying to make out his route up the mountain or where his tents lay nestled by the foothills. The distance and the haze foiled his efforts, but he stood at the brink of the little plateau for a long time, drinking in the frightening expanse.

"I didn't know there was so much land," he murmured. Ab'rim turned away eventually, shaking his head. He became aware the day had slipped away from him and he was very hungry. While the goats stripped the plateau of vegetation, he took out his sling and started hunting among the rocks. An hour later, he gave up. The plateau was devoid of any form of animal life save for himself and his goats. "We'd better go back down," he muttered. "At least there were birds and mice in the gully." It was then Ab'rim discovered he had a problem. One of the young goats was missing.

He carefully counted his flock, ticking off their names against the joints and tips of his fingers - Fidda, Inas, Rabi'a, Bahiyya, 'Abla - fifteen. He counted again - fifteen. Little Nadra was missing, and her mother, Rabi'a, was now running back and forth bleating wildly. Ab'rim caught the mother goat and secured her to the chewed-down remains of a shrub and started searching the rocks along the rim of the plateau where the land rose up again toward the peak.

He found evidence at once that a goat had been there - small droppings still moist when squeezed gently between forefinger and thumb. Which goat was another matter. Any of the herd could have climbed this far. He kept searching, calling out at intervals. His goats would not answer to their names - except Bahiyya, the beautiful - but they knew the sound of his voice. There was a good chance if the kid heard him, she would cry out. The mountain was silent except for the sighing of the wind, the muted bleating of the herd on the plateau below and the cry of a hawk stretched out on the air high above. Ab'rim continued climbing, calling as he went.

The shadow of the plain swept over him, and Ab'rim saw with some alarm nightfall had overtaken him. Already he faced a difficult climb down to the plateau in failing light. If he delayed, it would become impossible. He scanned the rocks, desperately hoping the lost goat would suddenly appear, but nothing moved. Dejectedly, he turned to start back down, knowing the goat would be unlikely to survive the night alone.

Come.