The power of Abu Lahab will perish, and he will perish.

His wealth and gains will not exempt him.

He will be plunged in flaming Fire

And his wife, the wood carrier,

Will have upon her neck a halter of palm fiber.

She saw the color drain from Umm Jamil’s face as the shriveled crone, too, remembered the verses that she had dismissed so many years before.

Umm al-Fadl walked out of the Sanctuary quietly, leaving Umm Jamil to ponder the terrible prophecy that had come back to haunt her.

The old woman suddenly seemed like a lost child, looking around in confusion. She saw people staring at her and backing away. Umm Jamil could feel something happening to her as chills ran up her arms and legs. And then she looked down at her hands and saw ugly red pustules spreading across her flesh like a wild rash.

She turned to her brother, who was looking at her face in shock. Umm Jamil touched her cheeks and could feel the hard bumps that were breaking through the maze of wrinkles that had long since taken away her beauty.

Umm Jamil knew what these pustules were. She had seen them once before when she was a child. They were the markings of the same disease that had destroyed the invading army of Abraha, the Yemeni king who had brought an elephant to lay siege to the Kaaba. That same year that her nephew Muhammad had been born.

It was the plague.

And then she saw with horror that Abu Lahab’s blood-soaked face was erupting in the same warts. He, too, was being eaten alive by the monstrous disease that always came without warning and could kill an entire city in a day.

“Help me…help us…” Her voice sounded distant and small.

But the crowd saw the telltale signs of plague and the plaza was quickly empty.

Only Abu Sufyan stood alone by the well of Zamzam, staring in horror at his sister.

She reached for him, seeking his comforting embrace. Just as when they were children and he would hug her when she skinned her knee and the pain would vanish.

But Abu Sufyan backed away, tears flowing down his face.

“I’m sorry.”

She felt as if a hot sword had been thrust through her neck.

“No…my brother…please don’t leave me… I need you…”

And then he was gone.

Umm Jamil stood alone by her dying husband, the ugly pustules racing like ants across her body. And then she fell to her knees and screamed. The terrible wail resounded through the city, carrying her horror across the valley of Mecca.

But her cries soon stopped and the echo vanished in the wind, to be forgotten forever.

10

One night, when the Messenger was out late for a meeting of tribal leaders at Uthman’s home, I decided to step outside my tiny apartment, which was beginning to feel like a prison cell.

Covering my hair with a dark woolen scarf and throwing on a cloak of golden camel skin, I slipped out of my house and left the Masjid courtyard by the northern gate. I had lived in Medina for over two years, but I rarely went out alone and there were many small avenues and streets I had not explored. I was not especially nervous, as the avenues of the oasis were patrolled by large numbers of Bedouin guards. The newcomers had sensed that the sands were shifting in Muhammad’s favor and they had sworn fealty to the man who was bringing order at least to the northern valleys of the peninsula. Even as Mecca and the cities to the south were suffering from a disruption of trade, the lands around Medina were booming.

As I strolled through the streets, I marveled at how wonderful it was to feel safe. I had been born into persecution and my earliest memories were of death and suffering. But since our victory at Badr, the storm had subsided and I suddenly felt free, like an eagle soaring through the skies unchallenged.

I was admiring the delicate arches of a house that stood on the outskirts of the oasis, where the paved roads melded with the sand, when a group of young men saw me standing alone. They whistled appreciatively and called out a variety of indecent proposals. Shocked at this crass impropriety, I turned to scold them and my face was suddenly lit by the full moon. Instantly their amorous attentions turned to embarrassment and fear as they recognized me. They had just propositioned the Mother of the Believers and risked bringing the wrath of God upon them!

The youths quickly bowed and scraped at my feet, asking forgiveness. I smiled, exulting in my young power, and warned them that if they ever spoke to a girl like that again, they would face grave punishment, which I left sufficiently vague to allow their own imaginations to take hold.

The boys scampered away, terror in their eyes, and I laughed. I was alone again and closed my eyes and let the warm wind caress my skin. I opened them again after a moment and looked north, through a gap in the hills that cleared a view all the way to the horizon. There was a whole world there that I hoped to see someday. Magical cities like Jerusalem and Damascus where the ancient prophets had lived. Or even further, to the famed seat of the fabled Byzantine empire. Constantinople, the largest city on earth, whose streets were rumored to be paved in silver and where the churches were as large as mountains. Or perhaps even beyond, to the ruins of a city called Rome that had once been the capital of the world but was now ransacked and forgotten. And if I made it that far, then I would of course go farther, to the lands where the sun is said to never shine and the world is lit only by stars.

It was a beautiful dream, and in my girlish heart perhaps I believed it would come true. I, who had been born with a wanderlust and a need for adventure, had known only two cities my whole life, both surrounded by sand dunes and policed by vultures and wolves. I longed to see flowing rivers and trees that carpeted the earth with life. To gaze upon mountains crowned in ice, where the clouds themselves fell like the rain. And it all seemed possible. I would never have believed that I would spend most of my life trapped inside the confines not only of this small town but ultimately inside the tiny walls of my home. Had I known what was to come, perhaps I would have kept walking that night into the desert, following the shooting stars to the wondrous world over the horizon. A world that would forever be outside the limits of my destiny.

A sudden cry awoke me out of my reverie. I pushed aside a strand of hair that blocked my ear and then listened carefully. There it was again. It was the distinct sound of weeping. Of a man crying in terrible grief.

I looked around to find its source. The only building nearby was a small barn that stood near the edge of the oasis. As I moved closer to the mud brick stable, the sound became clearer. I felt my heart pounding. Someone was hurt, perhaps had fallen and injured himself. God must have sent me here tonight to help this poor soul.

I approached the barn and pushed open the heavy wooden doors that had been bolted from outside. I was too naive to stop and ask myself why someone would be in a barn that had been locked from without, but I must have reasoned that the poor fellow had gotten stuck inside and had hurt himself trying to get out.

The door opened with a steady creak and the weeping stopped instantly. I waited for my eyes to adjust to the darkness within and then cautiously stepped inside. It was an old structure, supported by beams of palm wood. There were open stalls for horses, the ground littered with fresh grass, but I could see no animals within. I began to wonder if I had imagined the sound when I saw a flash movement against one of the walls. My heart leaped and I cried out.

And then I saw him. A wretched-looking man was curled into a ball inside the stall, his face bruised and caked in dried blood. As the moonlight strengthened my vision, I noticed that his hands were tied with a thick rope and were bound to a post.