Thousand & One Nights: Twenty Fifth Night: The Death of Black Slave

Story from the previous nights. The king in search of the mystery behind coloured fish and lake, in his search happened to meet the prince who was half man and half stone. Now he revealed to the king how his cousin wife by using Balck magic turned him to his present state.

Twenty Fifth Night:

The prince continued his story.
After my wife turned me into this condition, half man and half stone, she cast spell on the city, its gardens and fields, the markets and the very place your troops are now stationed. She turned the inhabitants of my city into fish. My inhabitants were Muslims, Magians, Christians and Jews. The Muslims were turned white fish. The Magians red, Christians blue, and Jews yellow. Likewise she turned the islands into four hills surrounding the lake. As if what she has done to me and the city is not enough, she strips me naked every day and gives me hundred lashes with the whip until my back is lacerated and begins to bleed. Then she clothes my upper half with a hairshirt like a coarse rug and covers it with these luxurious garments.

The young man burst into tears and recited the following verses:
Lord I bear patience with your decree
And so, I may please you, I endure 
Our recompense, your paradise 
Never let the tyrant go, my Lord
Pluck me out of the fire, Almighty.

The king said to the young prince, "You have lifted one anxiety, but added another worry to my worries. But where is your wife, and where is the mausoleum with the wounded Blackman?"

The prince replied, "O king, the black slave is lying in the tomb in the mausoleum, which is the adjoining room. My wife comes to visit him at every dawn. After that she strips me naked and gives me a hundred lashes with the whip, while I cry, scream without being able to stand up and defend myself. After that she goes to the slave, gives him beverages and broth. Tomorrow, at dawn she will come as usual."

The King replied, "By God, young man, I shall do something for you that will go down in history and commemorate my name." Then the king sat to talk with the prince until night fell, and then they went to sleep.

The king got up before dawn, took off his clothes, and drawing his sword, entered the room with the domed Mausoleum and found it lit with candles and lamps, and scented with incense, saffron, perfume and ointments. He went straight to the black man and killed him. Then he carried him out and threw him in a well inside the palace. When he came back, he put on the clothes of black man, covered himself, and lay hiding at the bottom of the tomb, his drawn sword hidden under his clothes.

The queen arrived, and the first thing she did was to strip her husband naked, take a whip, and whip him again and again, while he cried, "Ah wife, have pity on.me; help me; I have had enough punishment and pain; have pity on me."

She replied, "You should have had pity on me and spared my lover."

End of the Night


Notes:-
1. Magians: In Arabic Magians is the term Zorastrians. The term is mentioned in the Quran in Sura 22, verse 17.

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