Talha had been bitterly disappointed, but he had held hope that Jubayr’s loyalty to the old ways would prevent the wedding from ever happening. And he was proven right. But when my betrothal to Jubayr had indeed been abrogated, Talha had been stunned to learn it was because I had been promised to a husband with whom he could never compete, even if he had all the wealth of Arabia. And so he had forever closed that door in his heart. For Talha revered the Messenger, and he accepted God’s will, sacrificing one love for another.

Talha tried to turn his thoughts away from the past. But the world would not let him.

“The daughter of Abu Bakr was in fine form last night,” a deep voice said.

Talha looked up to see two merchants standing beside him. They examined a parcel of leather goods that had recently been smuggled from Taif in defiance of the Meccan ban on trading with Muhammad.

Talha stared at the two figures, who were conversing nonchalantly, a richly dressed tribesmen from the Khazraj named Sameer and his friend Murtaza, a Bedouin clansmen from the tribe of Tayy to the east. They were men who had some business dealings with Uthman ibn Affan and had been invited to the Prophet’s wedding to Ramla the night before.

“The Messenger is truly lucky,” Sameer said with a wink to his colleague.

“She is the most beautiful girl I have ever set eyes upon,” Murtaza responded with a lascivious smirk. “Is it true that she was still a virgin on her wedding night?”

Talha felt his heart thunder with rage. He stormed up to the men and pushed himself between them, his eyes burning.

“What shameful talk is this? She is your Mother!”

Sameer looked at Talha, in his faded wool tunic and dusty pantaloons, and his eyes mocked him with the casual cruelty of a rich man.

“Only as long as she is married to the Messenger,” Sameer said.

Murtaza stepped closer to Talha, his sunburned face smelling of oil and qat, the Yemeni leaf that was said to make men dream while awake.

“What if the Prophet dies or divorces her?” Murtaza sneered. “What will become of this delicate flower then?”

Talha’s heart was pounding. And then he spoke before he could stop himself.

“Then I will marry her, if only to protect her honor from scum like you!”

Talha froze, horrified that he had spoken aloud his darkest, most private desire, one that never should have been voiced in this world or the hereafter.

“It sounds like you have feelings for the pretty lady you call your mother,” Murtaza said.

The Najdi Bedouin put an arm around Talha in false comradeship.

“Don’t be ashamed, boy,” Murtaza added, amusement dripping from his lips. “If a son had a mother who looked like that, he’d be forgiven if he entertained a dirty thought now and again.”

And then, as if he were being moved by a force greater than himself, Talha swung forth with his scarred fist and smashed Murtaza’s teeth with one brutal blow. The stunned Bedouin fell back, blood exploding from his mouth.

Talha stood perfectly still, unable to move, despite the pounding agony in his ruined hand. And then Sameer was on top of him and he was being punched and kicked into the ground. Talha stopped fighting and absorbed the enraged merchant’s blows without crying out, even as he had done years before when Umar had beaten him in the Sanctuary. He could hear his ribs crack under the onslaught, the pain almost as intense as the agony that emanated from his deformed and brutalized hand.

Talha did not move, did not breathe. He let Sameer crush him into the earth. His eyes blurred and darkness flew toward him like a gentle blanket, come to cover him in the sleep of unconsciousness. If this was death, he could think of no happier end than to die protecting the honor of the Mother of the Believers.

21

I sat nervously inside my tiny apartment, which felt even smaller than usual, as all the other wives had gathered here tonight at the command of the Messenger. The harem had grown prodigiously over the past several years and now included six women-Sawda, myself, Hafsa, Zaynab bint Jahsh, Umm Salama, and Ramla, the most recent addition. The other Zaynab, the daughter of Khuzayma whom the Prophet had married to bring the Bani Amir into alliance, had passed away a few months before. Her loss had been hard on the lower classes of Medina, as Zaynab’s tireless efforts on behalf of the weak and the indigent had earned her the sobriquet “Mother of the Poor.”

I look back and realize that in some ways Zaynab bint Khuzayma was the luckiest of us all, as she left the world long before the terrible trials and sorrows that were to besiege the Muslim Ummah. And, perhaps most poignantly, she had passed on to the next world after having lived a life that was full and free of undue restriction or limitation. The simple normalcy of her daily existence, the pleasure of walking in public under the full light of the sun, would soon become a luxury for the rest of us-another disaster that was forged by my passionate and willful soul.

The tension in the room was thick, like smoke from an oven that has been left unattended for too long. The fires that were being contained behind the cool glances of my cowives was about to burst.

None of them was looking at me, except for Hafsa, whose furious gaze summed up their feelings succinctly. My flirtatious spectacle at Ramla’s wedding had brought shame upon the entire household, as well as violence to the streets of Medina. Poor unlucky Talha had been beaten senseless defending my honor from crass talk among the merchants, and the ensuing struggle had erupted into a vicious melee as outraged Companions had rushed forward to avenge him. Though no one had been killed, the ruckus had been a terrible reminder of the fragility of peace in the oasis.

What would happen next was unclear. But there would definitely be consequences, and the Prophet’s terse summons to all the Mothers suggested that they would all pay collectively in some fashion for my foolishness.

I looked away from Hafsa’s accusing eyes and stared up at the roof of palm leaves, where a gray moth was sleeping amid the crevices of a frond. I suddenly wanted to be that moth, hidden in shadows and ignored by the world, but free to fly away at the slightest impulse.

And then the door swung inward and the Messenger of God entered the room. He looked at the Mothers and nodded to each of them in turn without smiling. But when his eyes fell on me, he simply blinked and looked away without acknowledgment. My heart shattered like a mirror dropped from a treetop.

The Prophet closed the door behind him and then sat cross-legged on the floor. He breathed in deeply and then sighed wearily. But still he said nothing.

Moments passed, but the Messenger did nothing to assuage our growing anxiety. He simply sat, looking at us with a terrible patience that was somehow more frightening than any anger he could have expressed.

My mouth was painfully dry, as if I had eaten a brick of salt. And still my husband said nothing.

I could take it no longer. Even at the risk of igniting the rare fire of his wrath, I forced myself to speak

“Is Talha all right?” I croaked as if I had not spoken in years and my tongue had forgotten its cunning.

I could feel every eye on me now. The other Mothers glared at me in anger, but I did not return their cruel glances and focused my attention solely on the man who held my destiny in his hands.

The Messenger stared at the opposite wall for a long moment before he finally turned to face me. I braced myself for an outburst. Perhaps I even hoped for an explosion of outrage, a flash of passion that showed he still cared for me.

But when he finally met my eyes, there was no punishment in his gaze, no flames of wrath.

“Talha will heal in due time,” Muhammad said softly. “But the wounds to the Ummah will take longer.”