Jewel of the Nile

Chapter Thirty-Nine

They ate, finally – Hermione, not wanting to be discovered eavesdropping by Farouk before they’d even been formally introduced, had let Itmana tow her away from the library and in the direction of the kitchens, where the kind grey-robed women who’d bathed them and put them to bed earlier now herded them onto woven-rush stools and heaped food in front of them. It was a simple but immensely satisfying meal: flat loaves of a’aish, still hot and floury from the stone oven; grilled fish, fragrant with saffron and cumin and wrapped in plantain leaves; steaming tureens of molikhayya, a thick, weedy-looking soup made by boiling spinach leaves to the point of disintegration in heavily-spiced chicken stock.

Frankly, Hermione wasn’t certain about the molikhayya – though it was something of a Egyptian national delicacy, its presence ubiquitous on every menu in every street-corner café in Cairo, she had avoided it thus far. There was enough adventure in her life already, she’d told Bill just days ago (was it just days? Jesus, it seemed like a year), without her feeling the need to eat something that looked as if it had been raked from the bottom of a pond.

Now, however, she dug in under the expectant eyes of her culinary benefactresses – cautiously sampling one slimy mouthful – and blinked in astonishment. Texture aside, it tasted wonderful.

Or maybe it was just that she was so damn hungry.

In any case, she and Itmana had stuffed themselves until it hurt to breathe, then regretfully waved aside the offer of pastries and staggered to their feet. "What now?" Hermione asked, seeing no sign of their elusive host … and Itmana – eyes worried in her determinedly cheerful face – had thought for a moment, then snapped her fingers in sudden decision.

"The music room," she’d said. "You’ve got to see it – Uncle Farouk collects a lot of different things, but his collection of exotic instruments is one of his best. You won’t believe this room; it was my favourite place in the house, when I was small."

Hermione, who’d had the two years of childhood piano lessons that had been more-or-less-customary for every child in her neighbourhood, but who still didn’t consider herself to be particularly musical – except, thanks to Peter Granger’s tutelage-by-example, as an Informed Listener – shrugged, and followed her friend halfheartedly. Music-shmusic; it was the library that she was itching to explore, at the moment, provided that it wasn’t still occupied, and she could have kicked herself for not just suggesting it.

She had to admit, however, that the room into which Itmana ushered her a few minutes later was incredible. Tapestries, Moroccan carpets, pillows in every corner as long as she was tall, stacked one against the other in a charming sort of disarray that all but invited one to … well, wallow. Built-in folio cabinets against one wall, teakwood with intricate lacquer inlay; Hermione, opening one and scanning its contents at random, thought that Gram would probably trade the Proposal Scrapbook and all its attendant jewels for a couple of these operatic scores, some of which looked like first editions.

And then there were the instruments themselves, shelves upon shelves of them, from primitive conch-shell horns to ancient Celtic bard’s-harps to a gleaming rosewood case, lined in velvet and swaddling, in a silk wrap, a dark fragile butterfly of a violin – delicate as eggshell – inside which Itmana reverently pointed out the fading scrawl of the maker’s name: Guerneri. There were gongs of beaten brass, and a Javanese gamelan-closet, and zebra-hide drums, and a genuine Renaissance-era sackbut … not to mention an ocarina carved from a sapphire the size of Hermione’s closed fist, and a glass case that turned out to be full of ordinary plastic toy kazoos.

A satiny matte-black Bösendorfer concert grand piano held pride of place in the center of the room. Hermione skimmed one hand over that wide ivory grin, played a tentative chord, and could have sworn that she saw the sound shimmer in the air before it dissipated.

Wild.

"Do you play any of this stuff?" she asked. Itmana shrugged.

"Not really. We all played around with these things as children, my cousins and I, but none of us took formal lessons. We weren’t here often enough, or long enough, to really get hooked on it." She cocked an eyebrow toward the piano. "How about you?"

Hermione let the fingers of her right hand noodle out the first bar of a Hanon exercise, and blinked again. That same silver shimmer, this time with a distinct edge of kelly green – damn it, was even the piano enchanted?

"No," she said – better safe than sorry – and respectfully lowered the lid over the gleaming keys. "No, I don’t play."

Itmana looked skeptical, but didn’t press the issue. "Well, then, here," she said, and stooped to lift a small drum, shaped like an egg cup and fashioned in shining embossed copper. "Try this; let’s see how much rhythm you’ve got."

Hermione stared at the doumbek as if were a striking rattlesnake. "I don’t know," she demurred, and Itmana tilted her head persuasively.

"Come on," she wheedled. "My parents are going to be here this afternoon – I’ve probably got less than an hour of freedom before they lock the door on me and throw away the key. I could use a little stress release, and so could you – you can pretend it’s Khaled’s face, if you want." She sniffed. "Or his balls."

"Oh, I don’t know," Hermione murmured, thinking of that muttered word – Paeniteo! – and the bubbling, harsh sound of Khaled’s sobs. "There are worse things."

But Itmana had already installed the little drum in her lap, and almost without conscious thought, Hermione’s fingers moved to stroke the cool smooth skin of the head. The feel of it under her hands brought back happy thoughts of the Consortium, another elegant womblike place not unlike this bright rich room – sunlight through the windows, Areli beaming from the background, thin intense little Camilla, looking wise and saying Power—power most of all.

And then that made her think of her wand, unexpectedly – Ollivander, that old madman, and his dingy rathole of a shop that had made her mother’s lips thin disapprovingly and her father take a protective step closer to her, and then another, until the triumphant flick of her wrist when she’d finally picked up the one that felt right had nearly singed off his eyebrows. She still remembered the uneasy silence over ice-cream at Florian Fortescue’s after that – her father trying, unsuccessfully, for humour (Wow! Guess we won’t have to buy lighter fluid for our next barbecue, then!) and her mother openly shaken (Do you have everything you need? Can we just go now?).

That first giddy lesson in Charms – Wingardium leviosa!, and the feather ascending just like the book said it would, while Ron goggled at her and Flitwick beamed. The rush of relief afterwards, stronger than her hurt feelings and almost defiant, even as she curled into a soggy little ball in the girls’ toilet and sobbed: I belong here – I do, and damn them and what they think about me, anyway, the bastards. I’ll show them.

Two splintered twigs in a Cairo gutter.

Not even twenty-four hours without magic, and the lack of it was like heartburn, like a toothache. She let her fingers skim the drumhead, felt that familiar little tightening tug deep in her abdomen.

Flickita. Flickita thunkita.

A curl of energy prickled the palms of her hands. She fought back an exultant shiver.

Stop it. Stop it now.

But oh, it felt good – and she wanted to know …

"What’s that?" she asked, jerking her head toward the door. Itmana’s head jerked up.

"What’s what?"

"Did you hear voices, just now?"

"Voices? No. You heard voices?"

"Sounded like a man and a woman," Hermione lied. "Don’t worry about it – it’s probably just me hearing things."

But Itmana was already unfolding herself from her cushion. "I’ll go check," she said, her lips tight. "You’ll be all right, won’t you?"

"Fine," Hermione said to Itmana’s hastily retreating back, then immediately felt guilty. What a Slytherin thing to do, Granger – you should be ashamed. You’ve got her really worried now.

Her hands, however, were picking up the rhythm again – flickitathunk, flickitathunk, flickitaflickitaflickitaflickita – and that prickly feeling of power was moving through her, stronger now that she could devote herself to it and scarily euphoric. Focus, Hermione told herself, and scanned the room for something likely to experiment on.

One of those pillows, perhaps. She got her eye on a blue one edged in gold bugle beads and let her hands quicken on the doumbek. Magic surged up in a billow of silver.

"Wingardium Leviosa," she murmured. And could have wept as the pillow obediently rose to hover at waist-height in the middle of the room—edging itself steadily higher as she quickened her strokes, dipping as she slowed.

Cool, Hermione thought, letting it settle back next to its fellows on the floor, and looked around again. There – on the shelf – that sapphire ocarina; it’d do to try a Summoning Charm, wouldn’t it?

"Accio ocarina!" she ordered, and saw the sapphire shift on its shelf. Hah, she thought as it sped toward her.

And then the fact that both her hands were presently engaged became a slight matter of concern … she hadn’t stopped to think about how she was going to catch the thing, once it got to her, and it was zooming merrily on an unalterable collision course with her forehead.

Great. You think you’re so smart, getting her out of the room – it’ll be just dandy to try and explain how you knocked yourself out with an ocarina, won’t it?

And then, just as she was wondering whether to duck for cover or try, impossibly, to catch the thing, it stopped, and hung, twisting gently, in mid-air. Blinking, Hermione took her hands off the drum and turned toward the doorway.

Uncle Farouk.

**

"Miss Granger," he said, sounding amused. "I was told to expect a bookworm, not a stuntwoman. But then, I suppose the Gryffindor blood will out, won’t it?"

Huh? Hermione stared at him, puzzled. "Dumbledore?" she asked finally, and Farouk nodded, smiling.

"I met your young friend Bill early this morning," he said, crossing from the doorway toward her and casually plucking the hovering sapphire out of the air. "Most concerned for your well-being, he was. Albus had quite a time of it, convincing him not to come racing to your rescue himself. But both of us felt that this would raise fewer eyebrows at the Ministry."

He gestured toward the bruise on Hermione’s temple. "My apologies for injuries sustained in the interim. My great-nephew oversteps himself."

He balanced his fingertips on the discoloured skin over her cheekbone, murmured something quiet. Hermione felt the ache ease. "Thank you," she said, then decided she’d better come clean, if only to satisfy her own curiosity. "I saw you," she admitted, "earlier. In the library. I heard you cast the Contrition Curse."

"Ah." Those cool, steady fingers moved to the other side of her face. "Sounds like poetic justice in the textbooks, doesn’t it? But it’s a messy business, contrition. Never looks quite the same in practice." His lips curled. "Of course, most things don’t."

"How long does it last?" Hermione asked, and Farouk, settling back on his heels, gave her a long steady look.

"Until he atones." He swiped his thumb gently over her swollen lip, then picked up her right hand in both of his and studied her injured forefinger intently. Hermione was a bit startled to feel her torn nail begin to regrow itself. "He’s young, yet – all that hate is mostly hormones. Given the chance, he’ll make the right choice. Redeem himself."

Hermione frowned. "What if he doesn’t? Won’t it drive him mad?"

"I look out for my family," Farouk said gently, and squeezed her hand before he dropped it. "And for their friends. Though we’ve a greater bond even than that, you and I."

Hermione, puzzled at his soft tone, the wry twist of his mouth, blinked. "We have?"

Farouk nodded. His eyes were kind but rueful. "You’ve no idea, Miss Granger," he said, "how much you resemble Martina. Nor how potentially damaging your presence in Egypt is, for everyone concerned – yourself most of all. I must admit that I was hoping I’d never lay eyes on the Jade Priestess again."

Hermione’s mouth dropped open.

"You," she said. "You gave Gram the Priestess? You were her Jordanian admirer?"

Even before he nodded, it was all clicking into place. Hermione set her jaw and let her fingers tighten a bit more securely around the smooth metal edges of the doumbek in her arms.

Well, that did it.

Under the current circumstances, there was no way she was leaving this place until she’d gotten a good, long look at the library.

**