Assad was not the kind of man to ignore his instincts.
He had always known how to tell the difference between what he imagined… and what he deeply felt.
For the past few days, Yasmina had been leaving the palace at dawn.
At first, he thought she was going to the mosque.
But he soon realized that wasn't the case.
She left alone.
No guards. No lady-in-waiting.
With the kind of discretion only possessed by those who have something to hide.
So, that morning, he decided to follow her.
She moved quickly, as if she knew every twist and turn by heart.
She stopped in front of an old iron gate, pushed it open without hesitation… and disappeared inside.
Assad waited a while, hidden behind a crumbling wall.
Then he approached, gently opened the door — and saw a young woman sitting by the small lake.
She wore a flowing, light dress.
Her long braids fell down her back.
He crouched behind a tree, close enough to observe without being seen.
He stayed there, still, his heart strangely tight.
— "Tell me again about Italy," murmured Yasmina.
The young woman looked up.
A melancholic smile brushed her lips.
— "Italy… was magical. Florence was full of life. The streets were narrow, covered in ivy, and the air smelled of warm bread and citrus. We lived above a small market. Every morning we woke up to the merchants shouting, cheerful voices, the noise of life.
It was chaotic… but alive."
She paused.
Her eyes drifted far away.
— "Mama loved taking us to walk along the Arno. She said the water carried the world's secrets.
Amaya always ran ahead.
I stayed behind… watching the artists paint on the cobblestones.
We didn't have much.
But we were together.
And that was enough."
— "How old were you?" Yasmina asked.
— "Twelve.
That's when everything changed."
Her voice had hardened. Slightly.
— "And after that… you came here?"
— "No.
We lived for a while in Wadi Seraj.
A lost village, nestled between two hills.
But it wasn't peace we found there.
It was hell."
Her eyes darkened.
— "Our uncle's wife… made us live through things I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies.
She despised us for no reason.
Each day was filled with humiliation, pain, fear.
We didn't live.
We survived."
A silence followed.
Heavy. Full.
Yasmina looked away, hesitated… then gently asked:
— "Since you lived there… you must know the legend of the haunted oasis, right?"
Nahia raised an eyebrow.
— "The haunted oasis?"
Yasmina nodded, a near-conspiratorial smile on her lips.
— "Amira, my nursemaid, used to tell me stories about it.
She said a djinn appeared near the water, at dusk.
Beautiful. Elusive.
She would sing to lure lost souls…
And those who followed her voice never returned."
An invisible chill passed between them.
— "According to Amira, the djinn appeared about twelve or thirteen years ago.
A man from the village saw her first.
He described a barefoot woman with black hair, singing alone by the water.
Since then, people avoid the oasis."
Nahia stayed silent.
For a long moment.
Then she whispered:
— "People love to tell stories.
It's easier than facing the truth."
— "What truth?" Yasmina asked.
Nahia met her gaze.
— "There was never a djinn.
It was me."
Silence fell, thick as fog.
— "When we arrived there, I was a stranger. Twelve years old.
Different.
They whispered when I passed.
So at night, I would go out.
I went to the oasis.
I sang.
Sometimes I screamed.
It was the only place where I still felt alive."
A pause.
— "One night, someone saw me.
He got scared.
And he told people what he thought he'd seen — an apparition.
The rumors did the rest.
The voiceless girl became a myth."
— "You never tried to tell the truth?"
— "Why would I?
They needed something to believe in.
And maybe… so did I.
Being a djinn was better than being a witch.
Better than being a hated, foreign girl no one understood."
She looked away.
— "Sometimes, becoming a legend is all that's left to you.
They fear you. They avoid you.
But at least…
They leave you alone."
Yasmina didn't respond.
The wind softly lifted the veil of shadows around them.
In the distance, the muezzin's call echoed into the evening silence.
But in that forgotten courtyard, only two young women remained,
a long-buried truth…
and the whisper of a legend
that was no longer quite a lie.
---
Assad felt a cold shiver crawl up his spine.
Those words had just shattered an illusion he no longer dared to face.
He remembered.
A few months earlier, upon returning from the United States, he had left the palace early in the morning.
On horseback.
He rode to his old tent, somewhere near the desert's edge.
And that's where he saw her.
A silhouette.
Feminine.
Standing under the moonlight, near the water.
She was singing.
A strange, haunting melody.
Beautiful.
Inhuman.
He had fled. Panicked.
Convinced he had seen a spirit.
But two days later, the memory of that voice still haunted him.
And suddenly, he understood.
It wasn't a whisper from beyond.
It was a language.
Italian.
He had spent hours rummaging through his memory, piecing the sounds together.
Then he had returned.
At the oasis, he found no one.
But a bit farther, exactly where his tent once stood,
he found a comb.
Left there, on a rock.
Decorated with pearls.
Far too human to belong to a spirit.
From that day on, he had never stopped thinking about it.
And now, everything made sense.
It hadn't been a spirit.
It was her.
Nahia.