True to form, the merchant smiled widely, revealing a jungle of broken and blackened teeth.

“Only twenty gold dirhams,” he said, after glancing around to make sure no one had heard what a magnificent bargain he was offering the pretty young lady before him.

I suppressed a smile at the old fraud.

“I’m just looking. Thank you.”

And then I saw the silk dealer’s face change. He had recognized me. Suddenly the practiced showmanship vanished and I saw fear and awe in his eyes.

“You…you are the Mother of the Believers…Please, take it as a gift…”

He handed the roll of silk to me reverently, his wrinkled hands trembling, and suddenly it was I who felt like the fraud.

“My husband would not let me take something without paying,” I said hastily. I suddenly regretted having come here alone.

I saw tears well in the old man’s eyes.

“Then take it in exchange for a prayer,” he said in a voice that cracked with emotion. “My daughter Halima is sick with the oasis fever. Please pray for her. I know that God listens to the Mother of the Believers.”

I suddenly felt sorry for this kindly old man. He looked at me with the eyes of a child, completely trusting that I could do something for him. But I could not even find an answer for my own fervent prayers. I had now been with the Prophet for almost four years and my womb was barren. I had been praying every night for the past year for God to quicken my body with new life. And there had been no answer.

“I will ask my husband to pray for her,” I said softly. “And insha-Allah she will be healed.”

The merchant’s face lit up in a smile of pure glee. He fell to his knees and praised Allah so loudly that people in the bazaar stopped what they were doing to stare.

I felt my face flush red. I wished the old man peace and quickly turned to walk away.

And then I walked right into a tall woman whose face was almost completely covered by a black veil. All I could see were her gray eyes, which pierced into me like an arrow.

“Alms for a poor woman…”

She held out her hand and I saw that her fingers were finely manicured, not rough and callused like those of all the other beggars in the town. And yet there was something about the intensity of her gaze that suggested she carried more sorrow than all the hungry women and children who came to the Bench every day asking for food.

I reached into my small leather purse and took out a few silver coins. As I placed them in her outstretched palm she gripped my hand with terrifying strength.

“Let go of me!” I was suddenly afraid, even though I knew that if I cried out, the entire bazaar would rush to the aid of the Mother. But something about the mournful way that she looked into my eyes filled me with greater dread than the violent threats of any enemy.

The woman leaned close to me and I could smell rosewater about her. Even though she was dressed in rags, her flesh had the unmistakable scent of luxury.

“Your husband is in danger.”

My heart forgot to beat for an instant, and then made up for it by hammering with wild abandon.

“What are you saying?” I had to raise my voice to hear my own words over the pounding in my ears.

“The Bani Nadir plan to kill him outside the walls of their fortress,” she said softly, her gray eyes shimmering with tears. “Save him. Or war will be upon us and Medina will be washed in blood.”

I felt all color drain from my face. The woman let go of my hand and I felt my legs moving even though I had not willed them to do so. And suddenly I was racing away from the strange woman, away from the stands of olives and spices and jewelry, away from the cobbled streets of Medina into the palm groves that stood between the oasis and the mighty walls of the Jews.

I did not look back. Had I done so, I would have seen the woman in black bow her head in shame before removing her veil.

And I would have recognized the cold, statuesque beauty of a girl I had seen on a handful of occasions when the Messenger had met formally with the chieftains of the Jews.

A girl named Safiya, who had just betrayed her own people.

3

I tore through the palm grove, blinking wildly as the wind blew grains of dust into my golden eyes. The sun had set and a blanket of darkness was rapidly descending on the grove. I managed to clamber up the path and suddenly I could see the ominous walls of the Bani Nadir blocking my path.

I was relieved to hear the gentle tones of my husband’s voice in prayer. He was reciting a sura of the Qur’an that had recently been revealed, a beautiful poetic verse meant to ward off evil.

Say: I seek protection from the Lord of Daybreak,

From the evil of that He has created

And the evil of darkness when it falls

And the evil of witches who cast spells

And the evil of the jealous when he envies.

My eyes adjusted to the fading light and I saw the Messenger leading the Maghrib prayers at the base of one of the towers of the wall. I breathed a sigh of relief that he was safe. Suddenly I felt very stupid. I had no idea who the veiled woman was, and yet I had taken her ramblings as truth. Feeling my cheeks flush in embarrassment, I turned to go home.

And then I heard something. A sound coming from above. I looked up and my falcon’s eyes fell upon the old turret high above the ground and I saw the distinct outline of figures pushing hard against the old stone from above.

A tiny cascade of pebbles streamed down the side of the tower and then I understood. My eyes went wide with horror and I ran across the path, hurtling toward the Prophet like a crimson arrow.

“No! It’s a trap!”

And then I crashed against my husband with such force that I knocked him aside in the midst of his prayers. The Prophet fell backward and his followers immediately stopped the ritual and leaped to his defense.

And then with a mighty roar, an avalanche of stone blocks larger than my head came tumbling down the side of the tower as the turret crumbled and collapsed. The heavy boulders crashed right where the Messenger had been standing and would have buried him in their deadly cascade had God not used me to push him out of the way.

I heard a tumult of cries as the Companions grabbed the Messenger and pulled him back from the wall into the safety of the garden. They took refuge under a thick palm tree and formed a protective circle around him. The men had come unarmed to the feast, but I saw such frenzy in their eyes that I knew they would fight any attackers, using their fingers and teeth if need be.

I looked down at my husband, who appeared to be in shock. And then I saw the familiar tremor racing through his bones and I knew that he was having a Revelation. And then he went still and his eyes opened.

He looked at me in surprise, and then at his followers, and finally at the pile of sharp rocks that covered the space he had occupied only moments before. He blinked rapidly as his sense of self returned.

“Gabriel appeared to me as I prayed and said my life was in danger…but God would protect me…”

He ran a hand across my face, which was smeared with dirt.

“Thank you,” he said softly. I suddenly realized that I was trembling as wildly as he did during his mystical trances, and I hugged myself tight and tried to end the shaking.

I heard footsteps approaching and I saw my husband’s face darken. The smile vanished and was replaced by something so terrible that I quickly looked away.

Huyayy, the chieftain of the Bani Nadir, came running to our side.

“My friends! Are you all right?” he cried with an obsequiousness that did not come naturally. “What a terrible accident! I will order our masons to fortify the wall so that something like this will never happen again.”