Years passed in 's workshop. had grown. The lapis lazuli he had once ground as a child, kneeling before the mortar, no longer stained his palms; it was he, now, who held the chisel without his hand shaking. He had stopped asking questions of the idols long before. No one in the workshop could have said exactly when.
left 's house as the courtyard embers were dying under the ash.
The wooden door scraped against the fired brick. The sound was brief. stopped on the threshold. In the dark room, 's breathing was heavy, steady, broken now and then by the rasp of his dry throat. Nūnā slept near the loom, her arms folded across her chest. Her copper bracelet made no sound. waited for the silence to settle again, then crossed the threshold.
The streets of Hurmuzjard were empty. The day's dust had settled, cold beneath the soles of his bare feet. A smell of burnt bitumen and sheep fat hung between the gray walls. walked past the mudbrick cubes. Now and then a dog stirred in a shadowed corner, sniffed the air, then lay back down in the dust. did not look at it. He left the village behind him.
The canal path was narrow. The water did not gleam; it was a black band sliding between the reeds. moved away from the current. He took the way north, to where the plain of Shinar stopped being flat, where the first limestone slopes rose above the mud of the marshes.
He walked for two hours.
The soft ground grew hard. Gray stones replaced the dried mud. The limestone was rough, sharp in places. felt every edge under his skin, every crack in the rock as it climbed toward the ridge. His legs warmed with the effort. His coarse wool tunic scratched his neck, damp with sweat. He stopped halfway up the slope to catch his breath.
To the south, the plain stretched out beneath the night. The ziggurat of Ur rose in the distance, a square mountain of black brick blocking out the stars. On its third terrace, the priests had lit the ritual fires. The orange flames were small, fixed points, unmoving in the dark immensity. The city slept beneath the shadow of the great temple.
climbed higher.
He reached the ridge. The hill was bare, swept by a dry wind that smelled of salt and scorched stone. There were no trees, only tufts of gray thorn that hissed when the gusts passed through. sat on a flat slab of limestone. The stone still held the day's sun-warmth, but the wind was already cooling it. He set his hands on his knees.
He was alone.
The violet sky of dusk had gone out. Black filled the whole space above him.
A light appeared in the east, low on the horizon. It stood alone. The other stars were not yet visible in the still-dark sky. This light was white, intense, casting onto the limestone slab the thin, elongated silhouette of 's hand. It shone without flickering, like an open eye in the void.
watched it. It seemed to reign over the newborn night. Its brightness erased the blackness of the sky around it.
This is my Lord.
The thought came without a sound. did not move. His fingers gripped the coarse wool of his tunic. The cold of the Mesopotamian night was beginning to seep through the cloth, numbing his shoulders. He watched the star.
The hours passed.
The star did not stay still. It slid slowly westward. It followed a steady, unchanging curve, indifferent to the wind blowing across the hill. followed it with his eyes. It sank toward the ridge of the distant mountain. The white light brushed the limestone of the horizon, then, within moments, the dark rock swallowed it whole. The sky went entirely black in that place.
looked at the emptiness the star had left behind. His fingers loosened on his knee.
What disappears cannot remain with men.
What departs cannot hear those who call to it.
The stone beneath him had turned cold.
The night grew deeper. The stars multiplied, thousands of fine, fixed points, scattered like white sawdust across the workshop table. The wind on the ridge grew stronger, bending the dry thorns flat against the ground.
Then a wider brightness rose behind the black mass of the ziggurat of Ur.
The Moon appeared.
The crescent was white, sharp as a polished bronze blade. Its light spread across the plain, turning the black clay into a cold, gray surface. The limestone hills took on a silver sheen.
looked at the crescent. He thought of his father 's workshop, of the lapis lazuli eyes he slid into wooden sockets, of the sheep fat the priests smeared on the statues' flanks to make them gleam. Come morning, the men of the city would bow before those same shapes.
raised his right hand. His thumb pressed against his index finger, tight, recalling the gesture from the cave, the fresh milk and the taste of honey on his finger while death waited outside. He watched the white crescent climbing above the temple.
This is my Lord.
The Moon climbed the sky. It grew smaller, higher, whiter. The shadows of the rocks on the hillside stretched eastward, turned slowly across the stony ground, then began to shrink. watched this silent motion. The silver orb followed a traced course, an invisible path it could not leave.
The middle of the night passed.
The Moon began its descent toward the west. Its light turned yellow, weaker. It slid toward the gray mist rising from the great marshes. The mist wrapped it in a pale veil, then the crescent sank beneath the liquid horizon. Night fell back over the plain, blacker, colder. The fires of the ziggurat were nothing now but red embers in the distance.
looked at the marsh where the crescent had drowned.
Men keep watch for it. And yet it too departs.
If my Lord does not guide me, I will surely be among those who go astray.
He stayed seated in the darkness, eyes open, waiting for the light to return.
The east began to whiten. The gray of dawn erased the faintest stars, then the brightest. The wind kept whistling through the thorns. 's fingers were stiff. His lips were chapped by the salt in the wind.
The sky turned red, then orange.
The Sun broke through.
The first ray struck the hilltop, pink against the gray limestone. Then the immense sphere rose, blinding, red as an open forge. The heat struck 's face. The wind picked up at once, driving the morning mist out of the canals and the barley fields. The whole plain came into view: the brick cubes of Hurmuzjard, the silver canals cutting through the earth, the green reeds to the south. Everything was lit, warmed, visible.
had to narrow his eyes. The brightness was too strong.
He stood. His muscles ached, stiff from the hours of vigil. He stood on the limestone slab, facing the rising red light.
This is my Lord. This one is greater.
The morning passed. The sun climbed to its zenith, turning white, scorching. The dust of the plain rose in the heat, blurring the horizon. did not leave the ridge. He had no bread. He had no water. His throat was dry, tight as fired clay. His stomach cried out its hunger, a dull ache beneath his ribs, but he did not take shelter in the thin shade of the rocks.
The heat beat down on the limestone slab. The stone burned beneath his bare feet. shifted his weight from foot to foot. Sweat ran down his back beneath the coarse wool. He looked at his hands. The skin of his palms was dry, taut, marked by the cracks of the limestone where he had leaned through the night. In the creases of his fingers, yesterday's blue lapis lazuli dust still gleamed under the white light — the same powder that colored the eyes of his father's idols.
He looked down at the plain. The silver canals of morning had become streaks of fire. The brick cubes of Hurmuzjard were white, blinding. The reeds of the marsh no longer moved. Everything lay still beneath the vertical light.
raised his eyes toward the white disk. He could not look at it for long. His eyes burned. He lowered his head, waited, then raised his eyes again.
The disk did not stop.
The sun began its descent toward the west. Its course was the same as the moon's, the same as the star's. It decided nothing. It obeyed the path.
The afternoon stretched on. The light turned yellow, then slanting. The shadows of the hills stretched across the plain like long black fingers. The solar disk touched the horizon in the west, turned red, then sank slowly into the dust of the desert.
The last ray went out. Cold returned at once to the mountain stone. The sky turned violet, then black.
looked at the red ash still lingering in the west.
Even the greatest obeys.
He turned south, toward the ziggurat of Ur, once more becoming a lifeless black silhouette. He opened his palms toward the empty sky.
O my people, I disown what you associate with Him.
His palms stayed open. The wind of the plain blew into them. Dust settled there, fine and cold. He had to close them again.
Night had come back, much like the first.
The night wind kept blowing across the ridge. The dry grasses stirred in the darkness.
His knees gave way.
The limestone dug into his knees before he had willed it.
His palms struck the cold rock. His forehead touched the gray dust of the mountain. Face to the earth, breathing in the smell of dead stone and cold wind, he murmured:
"I submit to the Lord of the worlds."
His forehead stayed against the stone. The dust smelled of salt.
Thus did Allah show His servant the dominion — that he might be among those who believe with certainty.