Daily Times

“This will not be as the time when I disguised myself as an old man at Dar An-Nadwah. The plan was good, but Jibril gave warning. Chaos will ensue and blood will be spilled through the frame of a little girl.” Words of Iblis

The jinn leaped and danced and winked at their master. Smokeless fire and light twisted and turned. Singing erupted: “We were created before Adam. We refuse to bow. Our headquarters may be on the seas but our embassy is with the children of men. From desert to dunghill we inhabit the earth.”

More swiftly than the twinkling of an eye, the jinn selected as a messenger left the station on the sea. Stretching his foot to Pakistan he sought audience with Ifreet. From there he was directed to the Amir of Timergarah. The plan was hatched. A handful of jinn were dispatched to the bomb-making factory. Later that night, they invaded the dreams of the men.

It was in the middle of the night that the lead bomb maker felt a malignant energy course through his jugular vein. In his dream he saw a young girl walking to school. The voice of the phantom in his mind began to speak. “Take her, take her!” Tossing restlessly, he continued to sleep until the shadows of night began to flee in advance of the light. Looking down at his pillow he was startled to see a large scorpion. Leaping up, he flicked it to the ground and smashed it with his sandal.

The suicide vest was made that very day. The ball bearings, bolts and nails were meticulously placed. Care was taken to make it smaller but also thinner to fit the body of a small girl. The following morning two men and two women got into a car and drove toward the main town in Lower Dir District. Driving slowly, they located a young girl walking alone to her school. None of them had noticed the scorpion on the dashboard as they were intent on tracking their prey. As their eyes feasted on the little girl, the scorpion lifted his tail. Rushing from the car the women reached for the child. She was stronger than anticipated and in the short scuffle one woman lost her sandal. Stuffing a wet and dirty handkerchief into the screaming mouth, the woman contorted her face toward the driver and yelled, “I have lost one sandal!” The scorpion on the dash lifted his tail in triumphant manner.

The snatch-and-grab of the little girl had been witnessed by the sweets shop owner preparing for his brisk early morning trade. News travelled quickly to the family. By evening the home and small courtyard were packed with friends. Women gathered to console the mother in the bedroom. Offering food which she refused to eat, they left with eyes like moist almonds. “She is reciting the Quran,” they would say. “It is the same thing, over and over again!” One woman, eyes brimming with tears, whispered to her husband, “She is reciting Al-Falaq.”

The men kept up a brave front as they sipped tea. The imam leaned on his walking stick with his gnarled fingers moving tremulously, the blue of the veins on his hands like small and tortuous tributaries of water. “We must recite Ayat al-Kursi,” he said. The voice of the men began to fill the courtyard.

Several miles away, the wilted frame of a little girl lay on the bare cement. Rough hands were placing the suicide vest on her. She was aware of human touch but felt like she was at the bottom of a deep well. In the distance she heard the voice of her mother crying out to her, “Sohana, Sohana Jawed!” Struggling to emerge from her state of semi-consciousness she tried to sit up. A sharp slap to her face brought her totally to her senses. She was terrified. A woman warned her to be silent.

The voice of Iblis moved through his vocal chords like the sound of crackling thorns thrown into a raging bonfire. “It is time for Iblis’ cotillion. The maidens are our tillage and the bed which produces the seed of man is ours to destroy. Like Laocoon and his sons amidst the coils, so are the sons of men seduced by our call. Let the dead dance and change partners with the dead. Yes! Let Iblis’ cotillion begin!” The jinn winked and slithered to the discordant sound of pipes and bells.

Meantime, the scorpion had situated himself as a hood ornament on the front of the car. Not about to miss the coming show, he had stretched his un-sandaled foot and anchored it to the horizon. As the car moved steadily toward the paramilitary checkpoint in Timergarah, a donkey began to cross the road. It stopped and began to bray loudly, blocking the path of the vehicle. His master beat him vigorously with a stick. Braying again loudly, the donkey refused to move. The scorpion raised his tail as the four-legged sentinel continued to announce the presence of a jinn. Leaping onto the nose of the beast, the scorpion crawled into the flared nostril and what transpired next is best left to the imagination. Slowly, the car moved toward the checkpoint.

Pulling the little girl out of the car the woman began to hiss in her ear. Sohana saw the image of her father in her mind. It was a scene from long ago when she had shyly questioned him to ask if he was disappointed that she was born a daughter and not a son. Patting her head and gently pulling her braid he responded, “Allah loves little girls and so do I.” Her heart became suddenly calm. She felt as free as the wind. Slipping her hand from that of her captor she ran toward the checkpoint unbuttoning her blouse as she ran. “Help me!” she cried. “I want to go home to my father!”

The writer is a freelance columnist. She can be reached at tammyswof@msn.com