The Moghul

so much he decided to return for her. Although the sun was intense, they found her still alive. It's said a cobra was shading her with his hood." Shirin turned to Hawksworth, her dark eyes seeming to snap. "Can you believe such a story?"
    "No. It sounds like a fable."
    "Neither can I. But half the people in India do. Her father finally reached Lahore, the city in India where Akman was staying, and managed to enter his service. Like any Persian he did very well, and before long Akman gave him a mansab rank of three hundred zat . His wife and daughter were allowed to come and go among the palace women. Then, when she was seventeen, this little Persian girl of the cobra began her plan. She repeatedly threw herself across the path of the Moghul’s son Arangbar, whom she rightly guessed would be next in line for the throne. He was no match for her, and now people say she won his heart before he knew it himself. My own belief is she cast a spell on him."
    "And he married her?"
    "Of course not. Akman was no fool. He knew she was a schemer, and when he saw what she was doing he immediately had her married to a Persian general named Sher Afgan, whom he then appointed governor of Bengal, a province in the distant east of India. Akman died a few years after that, still thinking he had saved Arangbar from her, but he hadn't counted on the spell."
    "So how did she get back to Agra, and become queen?"
    "That part I know very well." Shirin laughed bitterly. "I was there. You see, Arangbar never forgot his Persian cobra girl, even after he became Moghul himself. And he found a way to get her back. One day he announced he was receiving reports of unrest in Bengal, where Sher Afgan was still governor, and he summoned the governor to Agra to explain. When no answer came, he sent troops. Nobody knows what happened, but the story was given out that Sher Afgan drew a sword on Arangbar's men. Perhaps he did. They say he was impulsive. But the Imperial troops cut him down. Then Arangbar ordered Sher Afgan's Persian wife and her little daughter, Layla, back to Agra and put them under the protection of his mother, the dowager queen. Then, just as we'd all predicted, he married her. At first he was going to put her in the zenana , the harem, but she refused. She demanded to be made his queen, an equal. And that's what he did. Except now she's actually more. She's the real ruler of India."
    "And you were in the harem, the zenana , then?" Hawksworth decided to gamble on the story he had heard.
    Shirin stared at him, trying to hide what seemed to be surprise. "You know." For a moment he thought she might reach out and touch his hand, but then she drew back into herself. "Yes, I was still in the zenana then, but not for long. The first thing Janahara did was find out which women Arangbar favored, and she then had us all married off to governors of provinces far from Agra. You know a Muslim man is allowed four wives, so there's always room for one more. Mukarrab Khan got me."
    "She seems very clever."
    "You haven't heard even half her story yet. Next she arranged to have her brother, Nadir Sharif, appointed prime minister, and her father, Zainul Beg, made chief adviser to Arangbar. So now she and her family control the Moghul and everyone around him." Shirin paused. "Not quite everyone. Yet. Not Prince Jadar."
    "But he'll be the next Moghul. When that happens, what becomes of her?"
    "He should be the next Moghul. And if he is, her power will be gone. That's why she wants to destroy him now."
    "But how can she, if he's the rightful heir?" Hawksworth found himself suddenly dismayed by the specter of Agra in turmoil.
    "No one knows. But she'll think of a way. And then she'll find someone she can control to be the next Moghul."''
    'But why do you care so much who succeeds Arangbar?"
    "One reason I care is because of Samad." Her eyes suddenly saddened.
    "Now I really don't understand. He's a poet. Why should it matter to him?"
    "Because the queen would like to see him dead. He has too much influence. You must understand that the queen and her family are Shi'ites, a Persian sect of Islam. They believe all men should bow to some dogmatic mullah, whom they call an imam . But this was never in the teachings given to the Prophet."
    A curse on all religions, Hawksworth had thought. Am I caught in the middle of some Muslim holy war?
    "But why do these Persians, or their imams , want to be rid of Samad?"
    "Because he's a Sufi, a mystic, who teaches that we all