Chapter 6 · Untitled Chapter

The tray came back at Abu Fahad's word, though no one had asked for it. The pourer crossed the majlis with the dallah in his left hand and the finjans balanced in his right, and the room made space for him the way a room does when the coffee is not the point.

I stood where I had been left standing, near the far arcade where the light from the courtyard did not reach, and I kept my eyes on the brass. It was easier than the faces.

"The sum is set," Abu Fahad said. He had taken the seat nearest the head, the one that is never offered and never taken by accident. "It is written. It is dated. It wants only a hand."

The man beside him, older and thinner, with a ring he turned as though it were a worry bead, said, "Tonight, Ya ustadh. Before the house sleeps. A thing left overnight in this city grows a story, and the story is never the one we wrote.