The City Of Brass
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She turns to her right just as the blob and the silhouette cease to switch. The yellow blob now stares right back at her from the wall. She staggers towards it with skepticism.
Bright.
Brighter.
The blob grows more luminous with each passing step. It takes on a golden hue, drowning out the bulbs on the wall and chandeliers above. She stumbles to a halt, eyes squinting to shield against the now painful radiance. They finally seal shut.
A few moments pass by. A chill drapes over her like a shroud, which then subtly gains warmth. Zahara opens her eyes slowly. Her vision fills with a multitude of colors, shifting in chaos accompanied by total silence.
A disco?
She blinks repeatedly, and finds herself in a room bedecked with gilded statues of warriors of an era lost in time. The blurriness gradually creeps away, leaving her amidst a dance of hues, which strangely center around a dazzling, majestic throne, occupied by a figure with withered and decaying ornamental cloth hanging by a few strands from her neck and wrists.
The figure remains motionless and appears unnaturally slender. Too slender. The bald head, topped with a diamond tiara, is unnervingly round and pale, with eye sockets that perceive utter darkness staring right at Zahara.
A dead queen?
Presenting herself before the queen’s skeleton, she extends her hands and rests them on the kneebone, something the queen doesn’t take lightly. She begins to disintegrate into dust, and soon all that remains of the skeleton is a pile of bony rubble and ash, her jewellery clattering deafeningly on the throne.
“Uhhh… sorry, I guess…Your Majesty?” she apologizes sheepishly.
Zahara suddenly notices a lamp at the back of the throne. Scooping it up carefully, she wipes away the ashes clinging to it, revealing a warped reflection of her own face.
“I wonder how many genies are inside” she wonders aloud, and rubs it furiously.
Nothing. Hopes dashed, she plonks it down on the throne, muttering words of dismay under her breath. Something catches her off guard; the back slab of the throne, instead of being smooth and unblemished, has been engraved with verses:
Bread and water; they slowly diminished,
Leaving everything else untarnished.
Resigned to destiny, they were tormented by hell,
All they dearly awaited was for Death’s knell.
She withdraws from the throne apprehensively, terror now slowly seeping into her mind. Suddenly a tiny blue speckle pops up right near her forehead. Growing in size, it jerks to and fro, left and right, almost like a frolic jig.
“Get away from me!” she screams. The speckle hovers up to the ceiling, stops, and whizzes down towards her head. She scampers behind the throne and clasps her head in defense. Nothing happens for a few moments. Cautiously, she rises to her feet to find that the mysterious speckle is nowhere to be seen.
Weird. Or have I gone crazy?
Turning towards the end of the room, she spots a dark chamber; an entry to a staircase, leading down from the throne room, seemingly the only way out. She enters the damp chamber and descends the stairs uneasily.
Sunshine greets her at the bottom. Her jaw drops at the imposing palace she has just exited; colossal marble domes balloon into the air, with black spires on top like pinpricks. As she plods through the gravel, a brass horseman slowly comes into view, its shine offering a stark contrast to the inky black walls behind.
Drawing near it, she makes out a giant key jutted into a rectangular hole on the base of the statue. On the saddle engraved, is another inscription.
Here lies a City of affluence and prosperity past,
Here lies a City whose breath was heard a thousand years last,
A curse of doom, on its people cast,
Here lies the City of Brass, of eternal silence vast.
She stares at it for a few moments, and pieces from the previous engraving fall into place. The key regains her attention, and she places her hand cautiously on it, reminiscent of the spring-loaded toys she used to play with as a child.
Is this…? Should I?
She grips it firmly and rotates, straining with effort.
Click, click, click, click.
A thunderous roar from behind jolts her to a stop, as the gates part. Taking one last glance at the palace, she bolts out of the gates into the sandy wilderness.
A lone lizard scampers to its burrow, as heavy footsteps stomp the sand beneath. Parched, famished and exhausted, Zahara spots clumps of dots scattered across the vast expanse golden dunes. She discerns the dots to be huts strewn across a flat lake, surrounded by trees.
An oasis settlement!
But, something interrupts her train of thought. Her conscience screams to make way towards the settlement to escape the barren wasteland and seek help. On the other hand, her logic reigns in the screams, telling her that it could be a trick of the mind; a mirage.
Glossary:
City of Brass — A splendid city struck by a famine. The people, after exhausting every effort to save themselves, went back to their places and awaited their fates.
