The Khan Saima Mir (best short novels TXT) 📖

and to stand by her. He knew she was coming for him, and he was in submission to the will of the Almighty. She has long planned the demise of the Jirga. Surprising, then, that she has bound it tighter and herself in it. Surprising but fortuitous. It is a cold woman indeed who would not spare her own offspring. And this cold woman will make a great Khan for our people.’

EPILOGUE

Jia sat on the bed, the baby in her arms, wrapped in the pretty pale green blanket that Maria had crocheted. Maria was due next month. Her legs swollen, her blood pressure high, she was on bedrest. She’d taken up the craft to stay busy.

Jia looked at the newborn, who had been safe inside her until a few hours ago. Closed eyelids, perfect pink lips, tiny fingers wrapped around hers, now out in the cold, mean world. Skin to skin, she pressed the baby against her breast. She protected those she loved, but one’s own children were a different matter. They didn’t listen, they pushed boundaries, they scattered tacks under their parents’ Achilles heels. Last time, the burden of parenthood had outweighed the love. She wondered how it would be this time. She closed her eyes and leaned back in the bed. She was exhausted.

Her labour had been long and intense. Everything had been fine and then the baby had gone into distress. A rush of po-faced medical staff into the room had alerted Jia and Elyas to the gravity of the situation. She’d been taken to surgery. Shortly after, the cry of a newborn signalled everything was going to be fine.

Elyas had been by her side the whole time. He’d looked tired and she’d sent him home a few hours ago. The baby had gone down, but sleep wouldn’t come to her. Her mind was exhausted, discombobulated, and her body broken. She made a note to speak to the doctor in the morning.

She looked up to see her brother at the door to her hospital room. He was holding a teddy of the kind only people without children would buy, and in his other hand was a flat brown box. She felt a rush of love and calm descend.

‘From Tarantino’s.’ He held up the box. ‘I’ll see that baby and raise you cold pizza,’ he said. ‘Breakfast of champions.’ He took the baby in his arms and placed it gently in the cot.

‘You OK?’ he said. She nodded, overcome by his presence and by all the things they had been through together. This was family. Here was someone who knew her beneath the armour, before the world took hold of her.

They sat in comfortable silence, Jia eating slice after slice. ‘Elyas doesn’t have a clue about food,’ she said.

‘What can you expect from a man who has oat milk in his chai?’ he replied, and she laughed. They hadn’t laughed together in years. He looked relaxed, fresh-faced and golden. He seemed easy in a way that she hadn’t seen since her return to the city. She felt herself relax and sleep came. When she awoke he was still there, sitting beside her, watching her, his face covered in brotherly love.

‘You snore just like Dad,’ he said, teasing her. ‘Must be the nose…’ He paused. ‘You know, for years I wished you’d died instead of Zan.’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘Me too.’

‘That baby looks like me.’

‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘You were a beautiful baby. So much hair, and huge eyes.’

‘I feel sorry for this little one…’ He looked down into the cot, at the baby wrapped tight in blankets, unaware of the world unfolding around it. ‘And I worry about you.’

His soul chose that moment to crack wide open and everything inside him poured out on to the hospital floor. Maybe it was because he finally felt strong again, maybe it was because Jia appeared weak, or maybe this was just how love for family was, messy and unconditional, made of ties that even knives could never sever.

‘I’m the one who stayed,’ he said. ‘I’m the one who looked after Pops, and took him places. I’m the one who held Mama when she cried, night after night. I’m the one who Maria leaned on.’ His face looked distant, and Jia wanted to take all his pain away and into herself and numb it with the morphine drip that was attached to her. ‘Do you know, she still sometimes calls me Zan? Maria and I are just shadows. Do you know how it feels never to be good enough?’ He looked tiny in that moment. He began to cry, his head in his hands, the sound of a man breaking in two echoing around the disinfected room.

Jia leaned over and put her arms around him, and he rested his head on her shoulder. They stayed that way for a long time, the tears rolling down his face and on to her neck, and her hands wiping them away.

‘I’m sorry I wasn’t here,’ she said. ‘But I am now and I’m not going anywhere again.’

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Here is my Jirga, the people without whom this book would not be what it is.

Thank you to Nikesh Shukla, if it wasn’t for your kindness, support and practical help this book would not be a reality. So many people offer help, but few go the distance. You’re a bona fide superhero and I’m honoured to know you.

To my agent Abi, I waited my whole life to hear someone say ‘I got this’ and to know that they really did. Thank you for fielding emails, handling calls and navigating deals. If I ever go into battle, I’d like you with me.

To Arzu and Helen, thank you for your invaluable advice, brilliant insight, and attention to detail during the editing process. You shone a light on all the dark places I was hiding from and forced me to raise my game, but you did it with kindness.

To my editor Jenny Parrott, for the ‘dancing’ emails, the ‘yes’ and