Days of Blood & Starlight

82 Top Three Reasons For Living

Zuzana and Mik were at Aït Benhaddou when it began. It. The thing that would never be eclipsed, that would own the third-person singular, neuter pronoun “it” forever.

Where were you the day it began?

Aït Benhaddou was the most famous kasbah in Morocco, much bigger than monster castle, though lacking the zest of monsters. It had been restored by World Heritage funds and movie money—Russell Crowe had “gladiated” here—and it was sanitized and set-dressed for tourists. Shops in the lanes, rugs draped over walls, and at the main gate, camels batting their astonishing eyelashes as they posed for photographs—for a price, of course. Everything for a price, and don’t forget to bargain.

Mik was bargaining. Zuzana was sketching in the shade while he, pretending to peruse a selection of kettles, purchased an antique silver ring that he suspected was not actually silver, and probably not antique, but indisputably a ring, which was the main thing. Not an engagement ring. He’d gotten the air-conditioning back on all right, but he wasn’t about to count that as one of his tasks, and never mind, ahem, curing Zuzana’s ennui. That was most certainly not a task. It was one of his top three reasons for living—the other two being the violin and holding Zuzana’s hand—and it was an activity he performed—participated in—with a feeling of deep gratitude to the universe.

To win her hand, though, he required a challenge. Two more challenges.

He felt a curious commitment to this whole task idea. Who got to do things like this? Monsters and angels and portals and invisibility—even if the last one was a little hard to enjoy on account of all the ouch. For that matter, how many people ever got to buy maybe-antique maybe-silver rings for their beautiful girlfriends in ancient mud cities in North Africa and eat dried dates out of a paper bag and see camel eyelashes, for god’s sake, and… hey, where are all the people going?

There was a sudden tide of rushing in the narrow lane, and hollering in Arabic or Berber or some language that was not Czech or English or German or French, and Mik watched in perplexity. The locals were hollering and rushing and then doors were swallowing them up and the lanes were empty of all but tourists: tourists blinking at each other as the dust quite literally settled, and, behind the doors, the hubbub intensified.

Mik pocketed the ring and returned to Zuzana, who was still sitting in the shade, but no longer sketching. She looked up at him, unsettled. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” He looked around. A few families still lived within the walls here; he caught a glimpse of a bright TV screen as a door swung open and shut. It was such an anachronism: a TV in this place… and then… and then the hollering turned to screaming. Such a pitch of screaming. It seemed to mingle joy and terror.

Mik grabbed Zuzana’s hand—a top-three reason for living—and pulled her across the way to where the TV was, to see what in the hell—or in the heavens—was going on.