The Market in Marakesh
While walking at night in a market in Marakesh, I met Death on the street. It was a chill night as the moon sat high on her throne, gazing down at the empty little street, sand eddies twirling together like lovers in a booth.
As I turned the corner past Adbullah's stall, I saw a cloaked figure ahead, hood drawn, a body tall and thin in a black robe. The figure shimmered as I walked down the causeway, my old bones shaking in the cold. Suddenly, like a lizard that scurried, the figure in the robe was before me, darker than they sky above.
"You are Safia, daughter of Hassan Azansi," it rasped, wind across a dry dessert.
"I am she," I said, fearful. I am old and carry little on me of value. What could this man want from me?
"I am here to walk with you."
"To where? My home? Sir, go on your way. I must be getting onto my husband."
"What a husband to send you out here alone, with nothing to protect yourself from?" his rasp was heavier now, curious.
"He sent me for his medicine, he has run out."
"He has sentenced you to me," he said, and pulled back the hood so that I might gaze on his face. Allah, he was older than I, face drawn tightly over bones to the point that he was a skeleton. Never a handsome man, his thoughtful expression bore sad eyes that watched me unblinking. It was as though he could read my soul.
"Away, from me," I cried, stepping back and now knowing him for what he was. "I still have years left. You won't take me yet!"
"But I must," he said slowly, voice like wind blowing through a house. "Ahead a man waits to rob and murder you. Your husband has hired him to remove you so that he might marry Fatima down the road."
"A pretty but empty-headed thing. Why would he do this to me? I have born him two sons and a beautiful daughter that made a good marriage."
"Because he shudders when he touches you. Your breasts are heavy from suckling three babes and your body has become soft from the many years you have lived. You are now middle-aged, no longer the great beauty that he desired in his youth. He wishes for a supple and young body that he might touch, not that of an old woman."
"I am not old," I grumbled, pushing past the skeletal figure. The night was wearing on and I needed to be home. But I heeded his words and wondered at such a thing, that death would come to warn me of his intent to steal me to the night lands. Before reaching the corner, I spotted a stick, hefty and solid. I was not so old that I could not pick it up and use it.
Walking on in my older bones - not so old at all - I rounded the corner and saw movement ahead. With a huff I kept going, listening as Death followed me, still curious.
The night was still and did not shift, but I could hear the slight movement of fabric against stone. And when the thief jumped out at me with dagger in hand, I hefted up my club and pounded him soundly in the stomach, and again hit him down on the back. He scrambled up and turned, pouch of gold clinking against his hip. The dagger lay forgotten on the stones.
With heavy breaths I turned to Death and watched him expectantly. He watched me back.
"Well, aren't you going to take me?" I challenged.
"You are brave to demand that I take a soul that is still living."
"But..."
"Did you die?" he asked, head titled as he considered me.
"No. So you won't. But I know someone that you can take," I growled. The dagger glinted in the moonlight.
My house was lit up with warm fires. It was a grand little house, with several rooms and even a bath! But tonight there would be no grand celebrations like my husband had thrown when we had married, or had babies, or when they had married in their turn.
I found him inside, stuffing his face with curried rice and pork.
Re-edited 3-1-18 for grammar.
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