Quest to Nahar

Chapter 1

Rustling in the bushes

A typical, light evening breeze blew colored and withered leaves off of a distinct roof. This particular roof, the mentor’s usual spot of choosing victims, barely served for its original purpose of sheltering humans. He was probably the only living being, besides the rats and spiders, who still made use of the place.

And yet the abandoned building stood proudly— almost as if it deliberately chose solitude over inhabitants. From a distance a hiding student sneakily took a peek. He had a hunch tonight would turn into another tiring chase.

His teacher hadn’t noticed him yet. Sooner rather than later he undoubtedly would. However, for the time being the student was in the clear. Usually, the inexperienced youngster exposed himself during the climax of the chase. He would miss an exit, or his foot would slip, or he would get lost in thoughts and breathe too loudly.

It was safe to say he had a lot to learn still.

The student flinched upon noticing movement from his teacher. The guru scoffed as he lowered his lean body. He bent his knees and shifted his weight onto the heels of his feet. His dilated pupils followed one isolated slave who lazily searched for a hiding spot in a corner of an alley. For a split second the student pitied the slave for having been spotted on his teacher’s radar. The slave might have survived the night if he didn’t have the audacity to slack off from his work and end up right under their noses.

The said slave picked his nose. He stared at his finger as he eyed the green prize that stuck to it before his finger disappeared between his plumb lips.

The student suppressed a snort as he watched his mentor narrow his eyes in disgust. This small action of the slave had robbed him of any hope or mercy from the guru. The latter truly despised such uncultured humans. Once, he had cut off a hand from someone who hadn’t cleaned properly after relieving himself from bodily waste.

The student slowly breathed out in victory as he had successfully suppressed his amusement from making a noise. It never failed to crack him up when he saw his teacher in this state. He fixed his focus back on the slave. He had now tucked his hands under his armpits as if he tried to use his arms as a blanket. His eyes were closed and his mouth hung wide open. The student wondered how long it would take before a spider or fly would find the moisty open space and crawl onto the slave’s tongue.

Much like his teacher, the student despised the humans in this area. They were like empty vessels, focused on trivial matters.

In all these years on earth the student hadn’t come across a human from this district whom he could call an intellectual being. All they seemed to do was work, eat, and sleep. He had spied on them for several years; eying their movements, listening to their conversations, measuring their physical strengths. What that resulted in wasn’t much… These humans only seemed to have a care about which woman they would steal, which food they would consume, and how many hours they would sleep.

Truly following his guru the student had grown hostile towards these useless maggots. And, thus, he had taken it upon himself to follow his mentor’s mission.

He would destroy them all.

The night would soon be upon them and the masters would hide in their pathetic excuses for houses. The slaves, on the other hand, were not as fortunate. Day or night; it didn’t matter. They were obligated to fulfill their errands. For the hunters it was the perfect opportunity to torture the mentally weak, to show them who possessed the true power and make them understand how insignificant they were.

As expected, not long after the sun left the town, and took along the feeling of safety. The guru stood up and jumped from one roof to the other. He didn’t shed a single bead of sweat as his light body effortlessly moved in the dark; navigating with his strong sense of smell. The student, on the other hand, struggled- yet was close behind him.

Finally, both of them spotted the earlier-chosen victim. The tall, well-built slave carried a total of three pots. One of them on his head and the two others on each shoulder. The student figured the pots were filled with water. He eyed the chosen one as the human muttered to himself and struggled to keep his balance.

Something suddenly shifted in the air and the guru stopped jumping. He looked behind him and showed his student a determined smirk. The latter sighed and dropped his face as he came to a halt next to the teacher. He firmly took his place on the rooftop while making sure not to stand too close to the other jinn.

This time the mentor had discovered him before the action had even taken place.

“Do you smell his fear?”

The younger jinn flexed his arms and cracked his neck; he took a closer look at the slave and noticed the slight shivering of the human body. He grimaced upon smelling the fear.

“Honestly, it smells horrible.”

“It’s an acquired taste... similar to eating bheeves.”

The student pulled a face, bheeves… the horribly bitter fruit his mother made him eat when he was younger.

“Well, let’s start then.”

The student flinched as his mentor disappeared in a sudden. He swiftly jumped off the roof. Just like that. The student couldn’t register a single sound when the latter’s feet landed on the soil beneath them. The older jinn made sure to remain unnoticed- moving with calculated steps. He trailed the slave until they both reached a darker part of the street. The exact border where the moon stopped extending its light.

The student remained in his place. It could happen any moment and from experience he knew it would become ugly… I don’t want to wash my clothes tonight, he thought to himself as he took a handful of his salvar in his hands as if to confirm it was still nice, dry and clean.

In the meantime, the human slave had become suspicious. He could tell something had changed in the air as well. He trembled as he looked in every direction; hastily searching for anything out of place. The hunter smirked. His eyes took in his surroundings. The doors and windows of the houses on the street were tightly closed. There were no lights burning in the small homes.

A visible shiver ran up the slave’s spine. The guru could smell that the slave had become aware of his presence. That single shiver turned into rapid shaking of the entire body. The guru smiled wickedly as he thought of all the possible ways of painting his new canvas.

The prey accidentally let one pot fall. The sound of the dried clay smashing onto the hard soil scared the human into screaming his lungs out. His high-pitched voice echoed in the street before it slowly died out.

The student sighed; that was pathetic. For such a well-built slave he screamed higher than a tiny schoolgirl.

The slave slowly bent down to safely put the other pots on the hard soil. Then he tried to pick up the broken pieces with shaking hands. The student lifted an eyebrow; why would a terrified slave bother picking up pieces of broken clay? Did the fear of possible punishment from the slave owners weigh heavier than the fear of losing one’s life? The student squinted his eyes. He noticed a single bead of sweat roll down the slave’s bare back. It left a big, wet trail.

The younger jinn leaned his head back with a smirk. He saw it all happen- how the slave followed the path of the spilled water, to how he noticed the huge shadow standing behind him, to how he dropped everything he was holding.

The guru stood in front of the slave with confidence. His tall, intimidating figure emitted a suffocating smoke. His pointy nails stretched and nearly touched the slave’s nose. He grinned; however, it went unnoticed by both the student and the slave. The guru had taken advantage of the darkness hiding his face.

‘’Please, please don’t. I have a family…please...’’

The student rolled his eyes; begging was futile. His mentor would never listen to the pleas of the prey.

The guru moved forward; closer to the scared slave who had yet to move an inch. The student studied the paralyzed body of the human. He had already come to learn that the humans were unable to flee when they reached a certain degree of fear.

Ah… there it is. The thick, hot tears started to appear on the face of the slave. His knees shook so much that his legs were covered in soil.

’’I-I don’t want to die!”

A disgusting sound pierced both the hunters’ ears as the prey inhaled his dripping mucus. The student rolled his eyes again and decided to rest his body on the ledge of the roof.

The shadow stepped forward in a sudden. His large hand engulfed the slave’s face and ripped it off in a single movement. The human screamed in terror. At this point the student wasn’t able to see his guru because he moved fast. The only thing the student’s eyes could keep up with were the parts of flesh that were flying around, the blood that gushed out of the exposed veins, and the twitching of whatever was left of the body.

It only took less than a minute for the guru to completely shred the human to pieces. The student erupted into spontaneous laughter. “Amazing!” he yelled at the top of his lungs. His eyes popped out of his skull as he leaned in to get a closer look. The guru wiped his face with a smirk and looked up to his student.

“I hope you took notes.”

The younger student jumped off the ledge. He kicked a hand to the other end of the street and hit a door with it. His wicked smile intensified as he stepped on the severed torso. He closely studied the piece of flesh as the blood was still gushing out. The fresh human blood smelled like rotten bheeves. It slowly flowed to the middle of the street. It gathered there and as it mixed with the water of the pots it turned into a puddle. The student took quick steps. He leaned in and looked at the reflection of the moon from above. He sighed deeply with his chest caving.

One day he would paint like his teacher.

- Two-hundred lunar years later -

‘’Just five more minutes…’’

Sura bit her lip. It was her last class for the day and time couldn’t pass slower. The brunette couldn’t contain herself as she impatiently tapped the ground with her feet. She took a glance around the room and as expected her classmates seemed to be equally restless as her. She definitely wasn’t the only one with an impatient tick, be it clicking pens, tapping feet, or the many sighs escaping the young throats in almost a rhythmic pace.

Sura raised an eyebrow as she spotted a few of her peers had their eyes trained on their laps. She concluded they were probably playing a game together on their electronics. For a split second she regretted not hanging out more with the gamers circle. At least they were too focused to feel bored.

Only a handful of students were genuinely scribbling down notes.

Sura crossed her arms and joined the sighing choir. Mr. Siddiq, their history teacher, was one of those air-headed types. He wore small, silver glasses which matched the grey hairs in his neat goatee. His hair was a total mess, one could swear he stuck his finger in the power outlet every morning before leaving his house.

His appearance matched his behavior. Mr. Siddiq would never notice chaos in the room. Sura often wondered whether he had a special device in his ears that shut off the loud noise the students sometimes made. She could not recall a single event where he told the class off for not paying attention. Or perhaps, he just wasn’t bothered with it. Come to think of it, had he valued the attention of the students, he would have changed his monotone way of speaking to hold their attention longer.

Sura narrowed her eyes. She blamed him for her bad grades. It was a hassle for her to stay alert in his lessons. She could barely keep her eyes open whenever Mr. Siddiq would start to talk. And, she surely wasn’t the only student struggling with that.

‘’This will be in the quiz of next week so be sure to note it down.’’

Mr. Siddiq moved his body as he turned to the board. Sura took this chance to close her eyes for a second. Her body relaxed as she could, at last, rest her heavy eyelids. Sura didn’t even feel bad about not copying the notes into her empty notebook.

I’ll remember this. It’s easy.

A small part of her peers disagreed. Sura heard their eager pens slide over the papers as they wrote down the information her teacher provided. Sura wondered how they still had the energy to focus.

The human’s eyes shot open when someone dropped a book on the ground. The brunette glared at the responsible classmate for disrupting her moment of peacefully slacking before she stared out of the window.

Fall, her favorite season, had arrived. The tree in front of the window slowly dropped its leaves from the high branches. Sura watched the wind play with them, making them dance in small circles over the ground.

Suddenly, Sura felt a shiver run up her spine. She frowned as goosebumps randomly appeared on her skin.

That’s weird…

‘’Sura, do you want to study with me in the library this afternoon?’’

The brunette controlled a yelp as she got startled. She turned her head to the source of the outspoken question with a glare. Zahra, one of her classmates, had daringly turned her torso backwards to face Sura. The former wore a questioning expression.

Zahra’s black hair was tied into a high ponytail and her bangs were neatly combed. Her eyelashes curled up- towards her plucked eyebrows, and her lip-glossed lips reflected the light that shone from above. Zahra put a lot of effort in her appearance, and oddly enough, she found enough time to be a good student, as well.

Sura couldn’t find time for either of those.

Sura relaxed her back and shook her head. She didn’t feel like studying today. Sura had already planned to walk with her dog through the old ruins in the belly of the city. She frequently did so and the last time the brunette had a chance to leave the house had already been over a week ago.

‘’I’m sorry, Zahra. I have important things to do.’’

Zahra gasped, ‘’Isn’t this important, too? We have a quiz next week!’’ Zahra pouted. ‘’Besides, I’ll help you with math.’’ she added with a wink.

Sura pulled up her nose. The brunette couldn’t deny the offer sounded attractive. Her grades for math had been dropping lately, and her mother was not happy with that. Sura was the lazy kind of student, so she hardly put any work into the subject. Zahra, on the other hand, being the smarty pants (who actually did her homework) easily scored A’s on her math tests.

‘’…fine!’’ Sura growled in defeat as she hung her head. She knew it was inevitable, sooner or later the brunette would ask Zahra to help her anyway.

Better get it over with.

Sura hugged her arms closer to her body. Her summer jacket was too thin to protect her from the mildly, cold breeze that terrorized the streets. Sura absentmindedly pouted her lips as she passed by one of the oldest houses in the city. It was huge. Perhaps, one could call it more of a mansion. It had brick walls covering most of the garden. She could only look inside through the vertical openings of the iron gates. The brunette had passed this house countless times but never did she have a chance to see the inside of it.

It had been empty for almost seven decades. Sura hadn’t even been aware of it until she overheard her mom mentioning it to the neighbor last week. Ever since that moment Sura’s interest in the house had peaked.

The brunette stopped when she walked past the small, sand path that led up to the iron gates of the mansion.

She decided to take a quick look and walked up to the entrance. She came to a halt and noticed the heavy iron chain that fastened the gates closed. She took a look around to find the intercom but she didn’t find anything besides rusty spikes on top of the iron entrance and even on the brick wall surrounding the estate.

Having lost interest in the intercom, Sura’s curious eyeballs peeked inside as she slightly bent her neck.

The front garden matched the size of the mansion as it stretched generously. The neglected garden contained more dead plants compared to their living counterparts. The leaves, from the trees surrounding the garden, had completely taken over the grass bedding. The few plants that had survived until now had grown large and left an intimidating air around.

In the middle of the garden stood a proud fountain. Even in its neglected state it was majestic. The white color had faded over the years as nature had tried to take over the artwork. Spots of dark brown and green oddly decorated the piece of architecture. A noticeable smile played on Sura’s lips as her eyes followed a small, blue bird. It landed gracefully on the edge, seemingly not minding the lack of water since the only things in it were crumbled leaves.

And then the human’s eyes landed on a statue. It wasn’t the only one in the garden but this particular one trapped Sura’s eyes. The statue looked alive, yet the human couldn’t make out what it was supposed to be since it wasn’t a masterpiece. However, it had a recognizable head and a disfigured torso which resembled a prism more than a body. It was bigger than the fountain as it almost reached the high, brick walls.

It looked creepy, and Sura didn’t like it at all. The statue didn’t suit the rest of the garden. As if it was a stray dog that had overstayed its welcome. It was an eyesore more than anything.

Sura suddenly gasped and harshly scratched her neck with a grimace. She had felt something against her neck, as if bugs were playing tag on her pale skin. However, her hand didn’t meet any culprit responsible for the uneasy feeling. Had it been her imagination?

Perhaps, her lack of sleep was taking its toll on her mind, which would also explain the weird, tingling sensation she felt throughout her body earlier during class.

Sura shrugged and leaned back. Something about this house dangerously invited the young adult. She couldn’t put her finger on what it was exactly; it was almost as if a distant voice called out to her. It felt as if someone had tied a rope around her hands and forcefully tried to pull her in. The human took in a deep breath hoping it would settle the uneasiness in her cells.

Sura heard something rustle in the bushes right behind the gate. The brunette snapped her head and grabbed the iron bars in a reflex. Was it an animal? Or a person? Maybe, a thief? Sura’s heart beat faster with each second that passed by. With adrenaline coursing through her veins; her eyes nearly popped out of her skull. Why did the innocent sound of the rustles make her this unsteady?

Sura could now actually see the bushes move. The brunette unconsciously let the cold iron go as she stepped back. Something was in it; she was sure about that.

It wasn’t a human or an animal. Sura was sure about that, as well.

‘’Is something wrong, dear?’’

Sura jumped up and yelped loudly. She turned around in a flash with her back against the iron to meet the eyes of the old lady who lived across the street. She immediately regretted touching the gate as the loud noise of iron clanging against iron rang in her ears.

‘’No-no-no! Everything is okay, Umm Rayan.’’ Sura forced out a polite smile as she frantically waved her hands in front of her face.

Umm Rayan nodded in reply while leaning on her wooden stick.

‘’You scared me a bit, though.’’ Sura quietly added.

‘’Oh, I apologize, dear. I couldn’t help but notice you staring into the yard. So, I thought perhaps you saw it.’’

Sura frowned, saw what?

‘’Well, if it’s nothing, I’ll be leaving first, dear.’’ The old lady gave Sura an apologetic look and turned around. The woman took her sweet time walking away. Sura concluded it must be because of her old age.

‘’Oh, and dear, one last thing.’’ Umm Rayan said as she turned around again. ‘’Don’t come close to that house. It’s not safe.’’ She looked at Sura with piercing eyes. The latter raised an eyebrow as her imagination flew to higher skies. The intense look the old lady wore confirmed for the brunette that she was indeed onto something here and definitely hadn’t just imagined things.

The young adult awkwardly laughed it off. Sura quickly said her goodbyes and continued walking home.

She glanced at the alluring house for the last time that day.

Sura had to explore it sooner or later.

Had to.