Desert Stars by Joe Vasicek Read Free Book Online Page A

answer. Jalil shifted where he sat.
    “ There are other reasons,”
he said, without elaborating.
    Sathi narrowed his eyes. “When can we
expect you to return?”
    Jalil squirmed, unsure how to answer.
For a moment, he considered evading the question, but that would
never do; it was now or never.
    “ I’m sorry, Father,” he
said, casting his eyes down, “but I cannot promise I will
return.”
    For several moments, neither of them
said anything. His father shifted uneasily.
    “ Why?”
    “ Because I must find out
about my birth family,” Jalil answered, squirming a
little.
    “ Ah,” said Sathi, leaning
back. “So that’s what this is about, isn’t it?”
    Jalil said nothing.
    “ Oh my son, my beloved
from the stars, why do you feel that you must leave us? Are we not
family enough for you? We who raised you from boyhood into a
man?”
    “ Yes,” Jalil said quickly.
“Yes, you are. You will always be my father, and Zayne will always
be—”
    “ Then why must you chase
after these shadows from the past—shadows that you may never
grasp?”
    Why does he have to make
this so difficult?
    “ Because I need to know,”
Jalil said as he nervously fingered the locket beneath his shirt.
“I need to find out where I came from.”
    “ You are my son. Is that
not enough?”
    No, Jalil nearly said. It’s not. Instead, he looked away.
    “ Don’t leave us, son,”
Sathi continued. “We need you here. I need you. Your sisters need
you. What will we do when all of them are married off? Who will
lead the camp?”
    “ I’m sorry, Father,” said
Jalil, bowing his head. “But this is something I must
do.”
    Sathi shook his head. “If you leave,
this camp will turn to the Jabaliyn tribe before I die. I had to
significantly increase Lena’s dowry for Sheikh Amr to agree for his
son to move into our camp. Unless Mazhar divorces Lena and returns
to his father’s tent, my debts will be nearly impossible to repay.
No, son, I’m afraid I cannot give you permission to go. I need your
help here.”
    Jalil fidgeted nervously. He had hoped
that it wouldn’t come to this, but now that it had, he saw no
choice.
    “ I’m sorry, Father—truly
sorry—but I didn’t come here to ask for your permission. I came to
ask for your blessing.”
    “ What?” Sathi asked, his
eyes narrowing.
    “ I’ve already made the
arrangements with Sheikh Amr. I’m leaving with the convoy
tomorrow.”
    Silence. Jalil held his
breath.
    “ I see you’ve gone behind
my back on this,” Sathi muttered. “And I suppose there’s nothing I
can do to stop you?”
    Jalil bit his lip and fidgeted
nervously with his fingers. His father closed his eyes and let out
a long, deep sigh.
    “ I should have seen this.
Of course.”
    To Jalil’s surprise, his father sat up
and brought out a thermos of coffee from the side of the couch.
From a side drawer, he produced two tiny ceramic cups and set them
on the table.
    “ So it’s my blessing you
want, is it?” he asked, filling both cups with the thick, black
liquid. He pushed one of them across the table.
    “ Yes,” said Jalil,
accepting the glass with shaky hands. The coffee would seal their
meeting, but until the sheikh drank from his cup, there was no
agreement, no understanding. No deal.
    “ As much as it pains me to
see you leave,” Sathi continued, “your decision comes at an
auspicious moment.”
    “ What do you
mean?”
    Sathi lifted the cup of coffee to eye
level and stared casually at it. “My daughter, Mira, approached me
not a month ago, expressing her desire to make the pilgrimage. She
has experienced something of a religious awakening recently, and
wishes to go now, before she marries. Of course, I told her that it
would be better to wait—that it’s customary for a woman to wait to
make the pilgrimage with her husband—but when I told her this, she
broke down into tears.”
    Jalil frowned. “Why?”
    “ Because she’s afraid
she’ll never marry.”
    At those words, Jalil