Chapter 1: Loss and a Beginning
The mornings in Yemen felt like a delayed dawn prayer.
Mud houses woke to the smell of coffee, while the wind played with the edges of old cloaks.
In a small home in Sana’a lived a merchant named Mutraf Al-Azdi, with his wife Asma and their only son, Suleiman.
Mutraf was a devout man, known among traders for his honesty and generosity. Whenever he spoke, people would say:
“This is what a man of Yemen should be.”
The merchants trusted him deeply. They would leave their goods in his care, and his wealth grew, blessed upon blessing. He loved his wife dearly and was gentle with his son.
To Suleiman, his father was everything a man to look up to, a future to dream of becoming.
Every Friday, Mutraf took his son to the market. He would sit him beside him among the merchants, teaching him numbers and kindness.
“My son,” he would say,
“A man is not measured by what he owns, but by what he gives.”
He would pat his shoulder and show him how to weigh goods, then laugh as the boy tried to imitate him.
Those small moments were treasures to the child treasures he would carry in his heart long after his father was gone.
A father’s gentle love built a sense of safety within the boy, as if invisible walls protected him from the harshness of the world.
In that warm home, filled with peace, Suleiman would fall asleep each night without fear of tomorrow.
From his father, he learned to read, to write, and to pray, but more importantly, he learned honor and virtue.
Mutraf’s trade was neither vast nor small, but he had a generous spirit.
In every journey, he would travel with twenty camels, bringing back goods from the Levant and the Hijaz fabrics, food, and supplies that the markets of Yemen lacked.
He also helped young merchants. Some began by carrying half a camel’s load, and over time their trade would grow until they owned one or even two.
One of them once said:
“By God, Abu Suleiman, your kindness is never forgotten. My brother and I started with nothing just a small sack each. Now we carry two camels every season.”
Mutraf smiled and replied:
“You and your brother are hardworking. If you stay patient, your trade will grow.”
“But we will never forget your help.”
“God is the one who helps, my friend.”
Mutraf also used to support Asma’s brother, Wael. Each time he returned from a journey, he would fill Wael’s shop with goods and allow him to pay later.
But Wael would sell the goods and never return the money. Deep inside, he would say to himself:
“What does Mutraf need with more money? He already has more than enough.”
Mutraf would often remind him:
“My brother, take your profit
but return the capital. I do not ask for gain, only that you benefit.”
Yet Wael held resentment in his heart.
Despite Mutraf’s generosity despite lifting him from nothing, from a man who once sat at the edge of the market doing small labor Wael now owned a shop in its center, filled with goods from the Levant and the Hijaz… all because of Mutraf.
Then one day, during a trading season, Mutraf set out for the Levant…
…and never returned.
The caravan disappeared.
News faded.
And little Suleiman stood at sunset each day, watching the road, as if expecting his father to appear through the dust.
Months passed.
Then years.
No one came back.
The long absence left a deep mark on the lives of his wife and child.
Wael took them in , not out of love, but out of greed for their home.
He sold the house and kept the money, claiming he would invest it for their sake. But instead, he treated Suleiman harshly, forcing him to work in his shop for half a dirham money the boy never even held in his hands.
During holidays, Suleiman would see his cousins wearing new clothes, while his uncle would “charitably” give him old, worn garments.
It left a wound deep inside the child.
He longed to buy sweets like the other children.
His poor mother would collect leftover food and save it for him, waiting until he returned from work, exhausted.
She would say gently:
“I saved this for you, my son.”
And he would reply, fighting his tears:
“You eat it, mother.”
But with her insistence, he would take it his eyes filled with silent pain.
And she would watch him, helpless.
Every evening, he watched the caravans leave at dawn and return at sunset, hoping just once to see his father among them.
Until one sorrowful night…
The boy hid himself inside a sack of fabrics belonging to merchants traveling to the Levant.
He was running away from the cruelty of his uncle, or perhaps searching for his father himself.
He was only nine years old.
