CALIPHATE(2)

Bashir's rifle was in his arms. It was hardly necessary. The Nazrani were like rabbits and no man needed a rifle to ward off rabbits. Even so, the presence of the weapon, and its display, was a badge of the superiority of the faithful and the inferiority—the helpless inferiority—of the infidel. Virtually all of the masters carried them almost all the time they were in public. There was quite a lively trade in personal arms, too. Nearly every town with any numbers of the faithful had a shop full of shotguns, rifles, and even automatic weapons for sale.

Rashid, their companion, just nodded. Like Mohammad and Bashir, Rashid also sat astride a horse, in his case a magnificent white animal. In truth, Rashid's attention was not on the birds, nor even on their prey. Rather, he watched the little hamlet of Grolanhei, part of his personal domain as one of the tax gatherers for the emirate of Kitznen.

Grolanhei did not have an arms dealer.

All my little helpless rabbits, Rashid thought. All you disgusting filthy Nazrani are my prey.

As light skinned and blue eyed as the wretched heretics that peopled the town, still Rashid more resembled his hawks than he did them. His eyes were bright, keen and avaricious; his nose a beak jutting from his face. Inside, too, he resembled a hawk, all fierce and selfish appetite, all blood-lust and drive to dominate.

Every year, at tax time, Rashid made sure to collect a few children in lieu of the taxes he deliberately set too high. He received a direct bounty from the bundejaysh, the army, for the boys he collected for the Corps of Janissaries. The girls went on the market to whosoever might want a female child for service. Sometimes that service was domestic. Other girls, especially the prettiest ones, could be sold for other purposes.

But the bastard Nazrani hide their women and girls now, Rashid mentally cursed. It's become altogether too difficult to tell which of their little bitches might fetch a decent price. Shameful for them to pervert the law like that. Bastards.

"Stop being such a girl, Petra," the young boy said to his sister as the two watched the bird of prey swoop and strike.

Petra bint Minden, aged six, had shuddered at the swooping hawk's cry. She shuddered again, shielding her eyes with tiny hands, as the hare screamed out in pain and terror. Barely, she forced her fingers apart to see the eagle carry off its limp and bloody prey. Again she shuddered, pleased that she was not so small as to be the prey of a raptor.

Petra felt her brother tug at her arm. His voice commanded, "Come on. The masters are coming. And we're almost late for school."

Turning away from the pasture where the eagle had struck, Petra followed after her brother on little legs. It was hard to keep up, what with the enveloping cloth sack the girl wore that covered her from head to heel. The covering was whole, though her mother had spent long hours patching and mending it. For it wasn't the law that required Petra to be so enclosed; she was too young for it to matter.

Rather, she wore the burka at her mother's insistence. As the mother had said, "Some of the masters take a long view of things. You're a beautiful child, Petra, though you're too young to know what that means. Even so, no sense in letting them see you and put you on a list for when you've turned nine."

Behind her, Petra heard a horse neigh, the sound echoed by several more of them. Turning quickly, she spied a group of three riding across the bare and open field. Two held their arms out, she saw, as another twirled something overhead. Two great hunting birds came to rest on the outstretched arms, one of them bearing the corpse of the hare. Petra knew they must be from the masters; Nazrani weren't allowed to ride horseback.

"Come along, Petra," insisted her older brother, Hans. Hans was nine, big for his age and strong. He was her protector and the hero of Petra's existence. Like his sister, the boy was blond with bright blue eyes. Folk of the town were already whispering that he was sure to be gathered for the janissaries within a few years. Unlike their father, Hans was too young to have the bowed back of the dhimmi, those who submitted by treaty to the rule of the masters, their taxes, and their laws.

There were several orta of janissaries in the old al Harv barracks set roughly between the town of Grolanhei and the larger one of Kitznen. They sometimes came to the smaller town to drink forbidden beer or make use of the town's dozen or so whores. (For the janissaries were well disciplined and rarely indulged in rape.) Petra found their black uniforms with silver insignia strangely compelling.

"Come along," Hans commanded again, grabbing her by her arm and pulling her back to the town that edged the open field. "We don't want them to notice us."

Bad things, so it was whispered, sometimes happened to blond and blue-eyed children who attracted the notice of the masters. Petra shuddered again and followed her brother, stopping only once more to turn and peer at the magnificent horsemen.